May 1941
As Ruby helped Jessie wash the dishes from breakfast, she realized that she was content. For the first time in . . . well, as long as she could remember, she had woken up feeling hopeful. Happy, even. It was so unexpected she wasn’t sure what to do with it.
For nearly a week they hadn’t been troubled by a single air-raid siren, and that had meant nearly a week of deep, uninterrupted, restful sleep. She had a home, albeit a temporary one, where she was liked and treated well. She had friends. She had work that interested and challenged her. She had a cat named Simon.
Setting the last of the dishes in the rack above the draining board, she dried her hands and gave Jessie a quick hug.
“What’s got into you today, Ruby?” It had taken months of coaxing, but Jessie had finally given in and had stopped calling her Miss Sutton.
“I’m feeling happy. That’s all. I’m off to work now, but leave the rugs for me—I’ll be home after lunch. I can help with the windows, too.”
“I won’t say no, but don’t rush home on account of me.”
“I won’t—oh, good morning!”
Vanessa had come into the kitchen, already dressed for her morning trip to the shops. “Good morning. Such a lovely day, isn’t it? And I have some good news. Did you hear the telephone ringing last night?”
“I did, but I was half asleep already.”
“It was Bennett. He’s back for a few days and wants to see us all.”
“That is good news. Were you thinking of Sunday dinner?”
“Clever girl. Yes, since my two are already coming—but can you invite Kaz and Mary as well? He’s keen to see them, too. Tell him half six for seven.”
“I will.”
Vanessa sat at the kitchen table and started writing out a shopping list on the back of an old envelope. “What do you think we should serve, Jessie? We’ve been careful with our coupons, so I should have enough for the butcher, and we can round out people’s plates with potatoes and whatever is ready from the garden.”
“I could do up a shepherd’s pie if there’s any mutton that looks half decent. Or braised rabbit might be nice.”
Vanessa made a face but kept writing. “You know how I feel about rabbit, Jessie.”
“I do, Lady T, but beggars can’t be choosers. Just tell Mr. Gower that you’re having your godson the war hero over for dinner and you have to feed eight. I’ll figure out the rest.”
With her basket on her arm and lipstick freshly applied, Vanessa set off a few minutes later, determined to be the first in line at the butcher’s when he opened at eight o’clock. Ruby left for work soon after, her mood soaring even higher, and even a long delay on the Underground did nothing to dislodge her smile.
Kaz was already in his office, and after hanging up her coat and hat, Ruby went to pop her head round his door. He was working on his editorial for the week, as he did every Saturday morning, and didn’t look up when she tapped on the doorframe.
“Kaz? Sorry to bother you. Bennett is in town and Vanessa wants you to come for dinner tomorrow.”
He looked up briefly, smiled, pushed his glasses back up his nose, and set to writing again. He didn’t type, so it would be left to Evelyn to interpret his nearly illegible scrawl.
“I know,” he said. “Bennett rang me up at the crack of dawn. What time do you want me there?”
“Dinner’s at seven, since Vi will probably be on duty later on. Anytime after half-past six. Oh—Mary is included, too. Is she in yet?”
“I doubt it. You know how she feels about mornings. I’ll let her know when I see her.”
Ruby greeted the rest of her colleagues and settled in to work. She was writing a short feature on paper salvage drives, and it had turned into an unexpectedly entertaining assignment. The government was urging people to hand in anything that might be pulped and reused for military purposes, and to that end they had set up scrap-paper depots as collection points.
She and Mary had visited a depot earlier in the week, and it had been fascinating to see the sorts of things people were turning in: soiled paper from food wrapping, labels from cans and jars, old telephone directories, last year’s magazines, last week’s newspapers. One family had donated a thirty-year-old encyclopedia in fifteen volumes, very much the worse for wear, as it had been living in their cellar for at least a decade. It wasn’t much of a loss, but it had been painful to watch, later that morning, as people brought in perfectly good books that went straight into the pulping bin.
Best of all was a group of young women who, having brought in their old love letters, were happily ripping them up and tossing the fragments on the scrap heap. Their donation didn’t amount to much paper, but the pictures Mary had taken, together with some entertaining quotes from the women, had transformed the piece from a rather earnest piece of quasi-propaganda into something worth reading.
She was home by half-past one and immediately set to work on her chores. She shook out the rugs and hall runner, using the carpet beater on the latter, and then stood on a short ladder to wash the outside of the sitting room windows while Jessie tackled them inside. After that it was time to tend to the vegetable garden with Vanessa.
Spreading marrow vines had already smothered the earth-covered top of the Anderson shelter, and apart from a good watering didn’t require much help, but the rows of carrots, bush beans, onions, and turnips needed to be weeded and inspected for pests, as did the potato patch on the opposite side of the garden.
Vanessa, who had been rummaging at the foot of the potato plants, now let out a triumphant hoot. “Look! Early potatoes!” She held up a tiny, pale tuber that was no bigger than a gumdrop. “As long as I’m careful, I should be able to get enough for all of us, and still leave the plants in peace.”
“The first of the carrots are ready, too,” Ruby added. “Do you want me to pull them?”
“Let’s wait until tomorrow. We’ve both of us earned a rest.”
THE NEXT MORNING Ruby slept in until nearly nine o’clock, and might have stayed in bed longer if not for Simon’s decision to sit at her window and yowl at every passing bird.
After lunch, she and Vanessa dusted the main floor and polished the silver. With Jessie as the only remaining servant, the work that had once been the province of several maids now fell to Vanessa and, whenever she was home from work, Ruby. Not that she minded. Compared to the cleaning work she’d done as a girl, the few chores she completed each day felt like nothing.
When everything was done and the house was gleaming from baseboard to ceiling, Vanessa sent Ruby out to the garden, instructing her to bring back enough roses and lady’s-mantle to fill the antique bowl on the sideboard.
As Vanessa worked to arrange the flowers, Ruby stood at her side and watched, fascinated, as the arrangement took shape. One day, if she ever had a garden of her own, she would grow flowers and put them in vases in every room.
“Do you know, I just realized it was a year ago today that Bennett came back from Dunkirk.”
“He was at Dunkirk? He’s never mentioned it.”
“That doesn’t surprise me,” Vanessa said dryly. “He was among the last to be evacuated. I remember listening to the wireless, to the prime minister describing what had happened, and I was just sick with fear. I hadn’t heard from Bennett for weeks and weeks, and I felt certain, by then, that he’d been killed or captured.”
“What happened?”
“He rang me up later that day. Heaven only knows where he was. And then, twenty-four hours later, he was at the door. Had come to London on some sort of official business, and he’d persuaded his driver to stop by the house so I might see for myself that he was alive and unharmed.”
“That was very thoughtful of him.”
“Yes, he is good that way. Of course I was terribly upset when I found out later that he’d been decorated by the king and never told any of us. I just happened to see his name in the paper.”
“So that’s why Jessie called him a war hero yesterday. What medal did he receive?”
Vanessa turned the bowl this way and that, looking for flaws, and added a few more sprigs of lady’s-mantle. “The Military Cross. Not something they hand out to just anyone.”
“I remember him telling me, when we first met, that he was with the Ox and Bucks Light Infantry. I never thought to ask any more. I had no idea.”
“Nor would any of us if it were up to him,” Vanessa said. She gathered up the trimmings and put them in the compost bucket. “He doesn’t wear his medals. Says they attract too much attention.”
“But he still wears his uniform.”
“Yes. Officially he’s still with his old unit—at least I think that’s the case. I suppose you could say he’s been seconded elsewhere, rather like you and your magazines.”
“Not quite,” Ruby demurred. “I haven’t been in the firing line.”
“Haven’t you?” Vanessa asked, and kissed her on the cheek. “Now, off you go. Read the paper or take a walk or even have a nap. I don’t want to see you again until dinnertime.”
Nearly the entire afternoon stretched before her. She skimmed through the morning papers, but nothing drew her attention. She did some mending, but only a loose button and a dropped hem awaited her attention. She picked up her book, a mystery novel that Vanessa had lent her, but set it down almost right away.
Simon looked up from his perch at the end of the bed, his expression hopeful. “Mrrrow.”
“Yes, yes. You think I should have a nap with you. But it’s far too nice to be inside. I’m going to take a walk.”
Pulling on a cardigan in case it was cooler by the river, she said goodbye to Simon and slipped out of the house. It didn’t take long, wandering through the pleasant streets of Chelsea, for her to reach the Albert Bridge, and after a longish break to admire the view from its central span, she continued across and down into Battersea Park.
There, life seemed almost normal. Children were playing, families were picnicking, dogs were running excitedly after sticks. Just another Sunday afternoon. But there were ack-ack guns occupying the running track, the park’s flower beds had been replaced by allotment gardens, and the drifting shadows on the lawns came not from clouds but from barrage balloons far above.
She was home by four o’clock, and after helping Vanessa to set the table, she returned to her room to change. Normally she didn’t spare a second thought for what she wore, even for Sunday dinner, but today she decided to make a little more effort than usual. It wasn’t every Sunday that they had guests, after all, and she and Jessie and Vanessa had put a lot of effort into cleaning the house. It would be silly not to take a few minutes to ensure she looked reasonably presentable. So she put on her nicest skirt and blouse, the ones she saved for days when she and Mary went in search of their stories, brushed her hair until it bounced smoothly on her shoulders, powdered her nose, and dabbed on the faintest stain of lipstick.
She hurried downstairs and, before anyone in the sitting room caught sight of her, tiptoed along the hall to the back stairs and joined Jessie in the kitchen. She would help for a few minutes, and once her heart had stopped racing, she would return to the others upstairs. It was silly to be so excited about a dinner party. There was no one upstairs she needed to impress. No one she wouldn’t see again before too long.
She set to scraping the carrots, but Jessie took the knife out of her hand after she’d reduced the first one to the diameter of a French bean. “Off you go, Ruby, before you leave me with a sink of carrot peelings. If Lady T asks, dinner will be ready in half an hour.”
When she returned to the sitting room, she found the girls seated in a row on the sofa, chatting away merrily. Bennett and Vanessa were standing in front of the fireplace, deep in earnest conversation.
He’d shown up at the PW offices a few weeks before, looking as if he hadn’t slept for days, and had promptly taken Kaz out to lunch. She had watched them leave and told herself the two men were old friends. Reminded herself that it was natural for them to want to see one another and there was no reason for her to have been included. When Kaz had returned an hour later, on his own, her heart had sunk into her shoes.
Kaz and Mary arrived just then. She greeted them, took their coats and hats, offered to fetch them drinks, and then, having helped herself to a thimble-sized portion of sherry, squeezed onto the end of the sofa next to Vi.
The conversation ebbed and flowed around her, and apart from answering the rare direct question put to her, she simply sat and listened and watched her friends. Bennett and Kaz were talking, or rather laughing, and she smiled to see the two of them in such fine spirits. Bennett looked the same as he always did, and fortunately bore no signs of any recent accidents with his motorcycle.
She stared at them, at him, not able to tear her gaze away. And it hit her, struck her like a blow to the face, and suddenly she knew. She had a crush on him, a stupid, childish crush, and that was the reason for her nerves. Her mouth went dry, her palms grew damp, and still she couldn’t look away.
His eyes met hers, though surely she hadn’t said or done anything to capture his attention. Something must have shown on her face, because he instantly left Kaz’s side and came to crouch next to her.
“Are you all right, Ruby? Is something wrong?”
“No,” she said, trying to smile. “Nothing’s wrong. I just, ah . . . I thought of something I forgot to finish off at work yesterday. That’s all.”
“Surely it can wait for the morning,” he said, his eyes searching hers, his expression troubled. “Kaz would never—”
“I know,” she assured him. “And I’m not worried, not really. How . . . how are you?”
“Well,” he said. “Busy.”
He was so close, his face only inches away from hers. He smelled of soap, the plain, strong sort that was all you could get in the shops anymore, and as he spoke she caught the smoky scent of Scotch whiskey on his breath. He must have shaved only a few hours ago, for his beard hadn’t yet grown in. If she touched his face, would his skin feel smooth? Or would she feel the rasp of his nascent whiskers against her fingertips?
“You look well,” he said, his gaze intent on her.
“Thank you. Everyone has been so kind.”
“I’m sorry I wasn’t able to talk to you, that day when I had lunch with Kaz. I was only in London for a few hours. But he said you seem to be happy. Here with the Tremaines, I mean.”
“I am. I love it. Vanessa and the girls have been so nice to me. I even have a cat now. I can take you to meet him,” she added, knowing she was rambling but powerless to stop. “He’s friendly but too many people send him running for the hills. He’s probably asleep on my bed right now.”
“What did you name him?”
“Simon. It was already his name. I mean, it was on his collar when we found him, but that was all. No address or anything else. We put up notices but no one claimed him. I think they must have been bombed out.”
Why couldn’t she stop talking? She had to stop talking—but if she stopped he might ask more questions, and he might press her on why she had looked upset a moment ago, and then she would have no choice but to get on the next ship leaving for Canada.
Jessie saved her then. Wonderful, wonderful Jessie. “Dinner is ready, Lady T.”
Bennett stood, his expression faintly bemused, and let Ruby and the other women precede him into the dining room. Vanessa sat at the head of the table, Bennett sat at its foot, and Ruby was sandwiched between Vi and Kaz on one of the long sides.
Once again, Jessie had performed miracles. They had vegetable soup to start, then braised rabbit with carrots and the new potatoes Vanessa had harvested the day before. Bennett had brought a bottle of wine, which he confessed to having liberated from his uncle’s wine cellar some months earlier. “Harry told me to help myself, since he’s not allowed to drink it. Doctor’s orders.”
“This is delightful,” Kaz said. “Shame that Jessie can’t be persuaded to sit with us.”
“She does when it’s just the three of us, but otherwise she retreats into the kitchen,” Vanessa explained. “I’ve tried, believe me, but she won’t be budged.”
As they ate, Ruby dipped her toes in and out of the various conversations that swirled around her. At one point she noticed that Vanessa wasn’t eating much of her dinner. “Do you think your mother is all right? She’s hardly eaten a thing.”
“Mama won’t eat rabbit,” Vi hissed in her ear. “She’s secretly convinced it’s cat.”
“It’s not cat,” Ruby whispered back, but only after she’d glanced at the bones on her plate. “The shape of the animal is entirely different. At least I think . . .”
“She’s not convinced. And, believe me, we’ve tried. But she says that once the head is off and the animal is skinned, it might as well—”
“Please stop, Vi, or I won’t be able to eat another bite.”
To Ruby’s right, Kaz and Bennett were arguing good-naturedly about postwar reconstruction. Kaz, to the surprise of no one who’d ever spoken with him for more than two minutes, was all for radical change across the board. But this was the first time she’d heard Bennett’s views on the subject.
“I’m simply not sure the public will be comfortable with sweeping change. Isn’t it better to address the worst inequalities first, and then move forward in measured steps?”
“When has that ever worked?” Kaz countered.
“What alternative are you suggesting? Stalin’s model of change?”
“If you were in the cabinet, Bennett, what would you advise?” Mary asked. “What would you tell the prime minister to do? Not just after the war, but now?”
“I’d tell him to stay the course. Lend-lease is turning the tide in our favor. With the United States as our ally—”
Kaz was shaking his head. “Since when? I don’t recall their declaration of war.”
“You know what I mean. The Americans are our ally in nearly every way that counts. They certainly aren’t aligned with the Axis states.”
“So you think they’ll sweep in to save us as they did in the last war?” Vanessa asked.
Ruby broke in. “Do you mind my answering, since I’m the only American here?”
“Go on,” Kaz urged.
“It won’t be anything so clear-cut. The U.S. will only declare war on Germany if we’re forced to do so. If Hitler attacks us directly.”
“And what if he doesn’t?” Mary asked. “What if nothing changes?”
“Then we’ll keep on keeping on,” Bennett said, “and pray the Russians are as good to Hitler as they were to Napoleon.”
“And in the meantime we’re meant to ignore the failings of our society? You think we should ‘keep on,’ as you term it, and turn a blind eye to everything else?” Kaz asked indignantly.
“No. Of course we shouldn’t. But we need to realize that no amount of postwar planning will help us if we lose the war. Winning the war is the only thing that matters.” Although Bennett said this calmly enough, his dark eyes were animated. Either he was very happy, or he was very angry. Perhaps it was a bit of both.
Kaz’s face was bright red, the way it got when he was spoiling for a really good argument, and Ruby could tell he was working himself up for another salvo in his argument with Bennett. She elbowed Vi, hoping she would take the hint and divert them with another topic, but her friend simply said “ow” and continued eating.
“Shall I ask Jessie if there’s anything for dessert?” Ruby asked loudly.
“By dessert, do you mean pudding?”
“Yes, Mary. Sorry. Pudding.”
“Of course there’s pudding,” Vanessa confirmed. “Jessie made her one-egg cake, and we’ve the last of the rhubarb compote to go with it.”
That had the effect of diverting the men’s attention to the topic of rhubarb. Kaz thought it delicious; Bennett pronounced it an abomination. The conversation went steadily downhill from there.
“Are they always this argumentative with one another?” Ruby asked Vi.
“Nearly always. Kaz takes a stance, Bennett challenges him, and off they go. They both love it, Bennett especially. It’s the barrister in him, I think. Why do you ask?”
“I guess I’ve never seen them together before, or not for any length of time. I’d no idea they acted like, ah—”
“Like thirty-three-year-old schoolboys?”
“Yes. Like that.”
After dinner, the Tremaine sisters went downstairs to help Jessie with the washing-up, leaving Ruby to join the others in the sitting room. Vanessa had flatly refused her offer of help when they rose from the table, insisting that she’d done more than enough already.
She perched on the sofa, in the exact spot where she’d been earlier, and tried not to think about how amusing and articulate Bennett had been at dinner. A man like him, with his intelligence and abilities, was surely wasted in some desk position in an obscure ministry. He ought to be working with cabinet ministers, or helping to plan top-secret military maneuvers, or advising the prime minister on delicate diplomatic negotiations.
Then again, for all she knew he already was doing such things.
“There you are.” Bennett sat next to her, his expression bemused. “I could hardly see you at dinner. Should have made Kaz switch places. The man’s a mountain.”
“The two of you were very entertaining. Are your conversations always so heated?”
“Almost always. I like to keep him on his toes.”
“I know I can’t ask about your work,” she said, her nerve almost deserting her, “but don’t you sometimes wish you were still with your old unit? Where are they now?”
The laughter fled from his eyes. “They’re stationed on the south coast.”
When he didn’t elaborate, she floundered on. “Do you ever wish you were with them? Instead of at the . . . well, the place you work now?”
He didn’t answer right away, his gaze locked on a spot in the middle distance. “No. Not anymore. Why do you ask?”
“It was something Vanessa said today. She, ah . . . she said you were at Dunkirk. That you’d been awarded the Military Cross.”
“I was.”
“Do you mind my asking why?”
He shook his head. “I don’t mind. Only . . . it’s not very exciting. I simply stayed on the beaches rather longer than I ought to have done. I wanted to know my men were safely away. And then . . .”
“Yes?”
“There weren’t many of us left, and the shells were dropping around us like ungodly hailstones. Several of my men were hit. I carried them to the boats. It took a long while, and a few of them were dead by the time we got away. But I did my best.”
“I had no idea . . .” she marveled.
“It’s a bit embarrassing, really. The fuss everyone made. Hundreds of men were doing the same as me, but for some reason my actions were noticed. You know how it is. The next thing I knew they were hauling me in front of the king.”
“And then? Why did you leave, and go to work for that bureau, or whatever you call it? You must have cared about the men under your command. Why not stay on with them?”
“Because I was asked to take up different work. It’s as simple as that.” For a moment it seemed like he might say something else, but he only shook his head. “Excuse me. I ought to see if the girls need my help in the kitchen.”
He left the room quietly, unobtrusively, and since Kaz and Mary and Vanessa were deep in conversation at the opposite end of the room, she was left alone to fret. Why had she kept pressing him? She had secrets of her own. She knew what it felt like when someone dug too deep.
She ought to have left him in peace.
And she knew nothing, not one thing, about the work that had taken him out of active service and into a mysterious position at the Inter-Services Research Bureau. Everyone knew there were top-secret departments working on top-secret projects all over England. He might be working at a desk job, or he might be unraveling the inner workings of the German high command. For all she knew, he might have been parachuting into occupied France once a month for the past year. It simply wasn’t her business to know, and it wasn’t in his power to tell her.
She couldn’t even cling to the notion that some kind of misplaced journalistic bloody-mindedness had driven her, for she knew full well that her curiosity was fueled by sentiment, no more. She was sweet on him, and it was her silly crush that had pushed the words out of her mouth tonight. As if knowing his secrets would also unlock the mysteries of his heart.
She was still fussing and fretting and torturing herself when he returned, a laughing Vi at his side, a few minutes later. He talked to Kaz and Mary, he embraced Vanessa and kissed the girls, and then he came to her, kissed her cheek without looking in her eyes, and walked out the door and into the night.
Somehow she endured another half hour of lighthearted conversation, unable to muster the energy to join in properly. She waited until everyone’s attention was elsewhere—Vi was mimicking Gertrude Lawrence—and slipped out of the sitting room. A minute or two alone in her room, just until she was feeling herself again, and she would return to the party.
Opening her bedroom door, she all but tripped over a large object that was sitting on the floor just inside. A typewriter.
How long she stood there, just staring at it, not daring to crouch down and take a closer look, she couldn’t have said. Only when someone came up the stairs behind her did she tear her gaze away from the machine.
“You found it, then?” came Mary’s soft voice.
“Yes.”
“It took Bennett an age to track one down.”
Ruby didn’t reply. She couldn’t.
“Care to tell me what’s wrong?” Mary pressed.
“You . . . you noticed?”
“What happened between you and Bennett? Oh, aye. Was hard to miss. One moment you were all smiles with each other, and the next . . .”
“It was my fault. I asked him why he’d left active service, and I think he felt I was disappointed in him. But I didn’t mean it, not one bit. I don’t even know what he does, so how can I be disappointed? But now he’s gone and I’ve no way of telling him I’m sorry, or to thank him for the typewriter.” She rubbed at her eyes, swiping away the stupid, stupid tears. When was the last time she had cried about anything?
“Ring him up. He told Kaz he wasn’t leaving until the morning. He should be home by now. Ring him at his flat.”
“I couldn’t.”
“You can,” Mary insisted. “Life is too short to leave things unsaid. If you hurt him, and if you want to put things right, call him now. Here—take this.” She handed Ruby a slip of paper with a telephone number scribbled in compositor’s pencil.
“How did you get this?”
“Kaz gave it to me just now. We both had a feeling you might want it.”
“Thank you. I . . . I guess I’ll call him now.”
The telephone sat in an alcove on the main floor, in what once had probably been a closet of some kind, and had its own little table and a stool for calls longer than a minute or two. Quickly, before she could lose her nerve, she dialed Bennett’s number.
“Chancery 8015.”
“Hello? Is that Bennett?”
“Ruby.”
Her hands were trembling, but somehow she managed to keep her voice steady. “I’m sorry to bother you. I know it’s late. I just . . . Mary gave me your number. I wanted to thank you for the typewriter.”
“You’re welcome.” His voice was flat.
“And I’m sorry. What I said earlier was wrong. I don’t know what you do, obviously I don’t, but I’m absolutely sure your work is important. It must be, because otherwise you wouldn’t be doing it. And I’m so, so—”
“Ruby,” he said.
“Yes?”
“I’m sorry, too. I . . . speaking about my decision to leave my unit is a sore point for me. If I could say more, I would. For now, though . . . I shouldn’t have left without saying goodbye.” A pause, as if he, too, were nervous. “Do you like the typewriter? It’s one of those folding models. And it should be lighter than your old one, too.”
“It’s perfect. But it must have been so expensive—”
“Stop. Just stop. It took me a long time to find that damn thing, so you’re going to keep it. Understand? I’ve no use for it—I never learned how to type. So you keep it, and use it, and if you run out of ribbons just let me know. All right?”
“Yes,” she said, and found she was able to smile again.
“I had better ring off. I have to leave first thing tomorrow.”
“Will you call when you’re back in London?”
“I will. Good night, Ruby.”
She put the receiver back on its cradle and stole back to her room, for she wasn’t quite ready to rejoin the party. The typewriter was there, just as she’d left it. Only then, as she bent to pick up the machine, did she see the note he had typed out for her.
to Ruby
with my regards
Bennett