Chapter Seven

“It’s a real shame Shirley couldn’t be here,” Doris stated, hugging Walter closer to her side.

“Perhaps,” Walter half agreed as they finished Doris’s tour of the rear of Ruth’s newly decorated cottage. “Remind me. Where did Ruth get the whitewash from again?”

Lawrence slapped a hand onto his friend’s shoulder. “Just who’s the policeman around here?”

Doris treated her favorite detective inspector to a kiss on the cheek, whilst Walter contented himself with a firm handshake.

“I don’t really want to know,” Lawrence backtracked. “Merely curious.”

“As Ruth reminded us, repeatedly, whilst we were slapping the stuff on, don’t ask,” Mary chipped in, chinking her bottle of Guinness against Doris’s.

“Careful now,” Lawrence said to everyone. “Here comes the hostess.”

“Careful about what?” Ruth asked as she stopped in front of them. “Where the whitewash came from? Don’t ask.”

“Told you,” Doris told him, deeply satisfied.

“How’s everyone enjoying themselves?” Mary asked, hoping to break the line of conversation.

Ruth joined everyone in looking around. It wasn’t the party she wanted to have, but as a thank-you to Hamble’s Home Guard, it more than served its purpose.

A few months ago, a German bomber had jettisoned a bomb whilst flying over her cottage after raiding nearby Portsmouth. Fortunately, the explosion was far enough away that no real damage occurred, but most of the tiles of her rear roof had been blown off, together with all the windows blown in. Peppered with shrapnel and debris, the rear of the dwelling had taken the brunt of the blast and had looked a mess.

Walter, a recently joined member of the Home Guard, had led the charge of the platoon toward the fire the bomb had caused in the field behind Ruth’s cottage, and with their aid the fire had been extinguished before it could do any real harm. Going above and beyond the call of duty, so far as Ruth was concerned, they’d turned up during the next couple of days and put in place temporary repairs to the roof and all the holes left by her sudden lack of windows and doors. Because of this, she and her lodgers—Lawrence, at the time, and the now departed Shirley—had been able to move back in after only a few days.

Today was proving to be a rare November Sunday afternoon—it wasn’t raining. A decorating table, covered with a white sheet, stood near the open back door, laden down with all the food and nibbles Ruth had been able to drum up. Betty and her team had chipped in as well—the sausage rolls were the first thing anyone had seen Penny bake and seemed to be going down well. Ruth’s specialty rock buns were nearly all gone, though the less said about the pumpkin soup the better. It had seemed like a good idea to use up some of the pumpkin left over from the Thanksgiving lunch and still taking up space in Betty’s icebox. However, it seemed no one was brave enough to try the orange concoction.

If she’d been worried about there being enough food to go around, she needn’t have. Most of the Home Guard appeared to be married, and even under wartime restrictions nobody liked to turn up without bringing something. Some couples brought bottles of stout or beer. Others were just as welcome with homemade wine of various and lurid varieties, some of which Ruth was trying to gather up the courage to try. Spam hash and fritters had been presented by at least three families, currant buns (mostly sans currants) were piled high, and there were even a couple of apple crumbles, which in particular were proving very popular.

Ruth turned back from appraising the gathering and smiled. “Considering there’s a fair few more people than I’d reckoned upon, I think it’s going well.”

“I think it’s going very well,” Home Guard Sergeant Matthew Green announced, stepping up to join the group, a bottle of beer in one hand and a plate of food in the other.

“Hello, Matthew. Enjoying yourself?” she asked.

“Everyone’s having a great time, thanks. This was a great idea!”

Ruth leant her head over and, for just a second, looked about to kiss him on the cheek. Indeed, Lawrence had opened his mouth to speak but stopped himself as his aunt thought otherwise of her action and took a small step back. “Well, there are more people than I thought. It seems half the village has turned up, but it feels like it’s what everyone needed.”

A burst of laughter from where Ruth’s makeshift chicken coop stood made all their heads turn.

“I see what you mean,” Mary said.

Matthew looked around before asking, “Where’s young Penny? I’d have thought she’d be here.”

“She went to see her husband,” Doris supplied. “It seems she’s got something to tell him.”

****

“You know, darling,” Tom Alsop said, his arm tight around the shoulders of his wife, “one of these days, you’re going to get yourself shot down.”

“What a strange thing to say.”

“Claiming you’ve got engine trouble, only so you can pop into an operational base to see your husband? Someday, you’re going to meet a military policeman you can’t talk your way around.”

“Never going to happen. Our Doris taught me a few tricks,” she replied, full of confidence, though she did notice the way her husband’s eyebrows shot up. “Don’t worry. You know Doris is a real sweety. Plus, she is engaged, so she’s nearly a respectable woman.”

“As if,” Tom teased her.

Penny rapidly elbowed her husband in the stomach. “Don’t toy with Doris. Not only is she wilier than anybody else I know, I love her like she were my own sister.”

To show there were no hard feelings, Tom took his wife by the hand and pulled her to the side entrance of his squadron’s hangar. Wrapping his arms around her, he lowered his head and touched his lips to the cherry red ones of his wife. If anyone else was around, neither would have cared as they proceeded to make up for lost time.

When they finally parted, Penny’s lips were swollen and even slightly sore. She cared not a jot, as sometimes she forgot how it felt to be in her husband’s arms. In those times, she felt the pain of living apart from him all the more. It was only by reminding herself she wasn’t the only woman separated from her husband by the war that she kept from screaming out at the injustice of it all. The thought reminded her of the conversation she’d been meaning to have with him on their belated holiday a few months ago.

“Come on.” She grabbed hold of his hand and pulled him toward the door. “We need some privacy. Careful!” She swatted him on the arm when he waggled his eyebrows suggestively at her.

A minute later, Penny had only just closed the door of Tom’s office, not even getting so far as to open her mouth, before there was a knock on the door. “Bloody hell!”

“Let me,” Tom told her, thinking so long as it wouldn’t affect the outcome of the war he’d shoot whoever it was, he opened the door.

“Hello, Wing Commander Alsop.” Sharon Coates, the girl who worked in the squadron canteen, thrust her head through the small opening Tom left. “Penny! I thought so. Anyone care for a cup of tea?’”

Penny had met Sharon earlier in the year when she’d delivered the horrible news about Tom’s brother Sam, who was killed when the ship he was serving on had been sunk. Last she knew, the young woman, nearly eighteen, had begun stepping out with Tom’s navigator and friend, Flight Sergeant Stan Atkins.

“Yes, please,” Penny answered and then asked, as she was curious and couldn’t help liking the girl even though they’d met only a few times. “How’re things with Stan?”

Fighting the blush which immediately sprang to her cheeks, the girl muttered what sounded like, “Fine,” and rushed off, presumably to organize the tea.

Whilst she thought about it, Penny asked her husband, “How are they doing? He’s treating her well? How’s his recovery?”

Taking her by the hand, Tom led her to one of his two semi-comfy armchairs and sat her down, taking the one beside her. “She’s been treated very well,” Tom assured her. “No one makes a cup of tea quite like Sharon, so everyone on the squadron is suddenly behaving as if they’re her father. Stan wouldn’t dare to do anything to upset her—half the lads would string him up if they lost her cuppa.”

“Good for them,” Penny declared, squirming in her seat, trying to get comfortable. “Mind you,’” she told him, moving to lean toward him and finding it much easier to do so in her flying suit than in her skirt, “if she ever fancies a change, we’d take her in a flash. Our new mess manager, Mavis, can’t make a cup of tea for toffee.”

“We’d better be careful, then,” Tom decided, taking his wife’s hand in his.

“And his wounds?” Penny asked again. When her husband had been wounded, so had Stan. When she got to the hospital, she’d found out how close a friendship the two had as, despite his burns, Stan had waited outside Tom’s room until he could be assured his boss and friend was going to be all right. How could you not feel affection for someone when they did something like that?

“Pretty much healed. Don’t say anything. I know what you’re going to say—why’s he flying, then, if he’s not completely healed.” Tom hushed her when she would have interrupted. “We’ve a shortage of navigators, and Stan’s the best on my squadron. Believe me, if I could get away with grounding him too, I would. I am keeping an eye on him, though. Sharon makes sure I do.”

Penny grinned. “Good for her. Now, how are you, Tom?”

Before he answered, Tom made certain the door was closed. Whilst he was standing up, he hurriedly untucked his shirt to show his wife his chest. “You can barely see them now.”

From where she sat only a few feet away, Penny decided he was being deluded if he thought he was healed. Cut up when his Mosquito had been hit, she could still easily make out the red lines where the shrapnel had smashed into her husband’s body, and she had to work hard to get rid of the queasy feeling in her stomach. Forcing a smile, she looked up at her Tom. “Looks much better.”

She’d said the right thing, and he made himself presentable, kissed her on the forehead, and took back his seat. Just in time, too, as there came a knock on the door, and again without waiting for a reply, Sharon nudged the door open with a tray containing a teapot, two mugs which had seen better days, and a chipped plate with a few sorry-looking biscuits.

“Sorry about the biscuit selection, boss,” she said, setting the tray on the small table between the two of them. “The Naafi’s running a bit short.”

“Don’t worry. Thank you, Sharon,” Tom replied. Sharon took the unsaid hint and, smiling, closed the door behind her. “Shall I be mother?” Tom offered.

Raising her cup to her lips, Penny sniffed and then took a sip. Unable to prevent a satisfied, “Ah,” from escaping her lips, she took a longer sip before putting her mug down.

“The perfect temperature, the perfect taste,” Penny declared. “Even without sugar.”

“Don’t you go telling her,” her husband retorted. “If she leaves, we’ll lose the war tomorrow.”

“Well…” Penny began and then remembered what they’d been discussing, not to mention what she still had to talk to him about, and reluctantly put the glorious cup of tea from her mind. “Let’s agree those wounds don’t look too bad. Now, about these headaches…”

Upon her mentioning this, her husband’s mood turned. He didn’t immediately say anything, yet he sat back in his seat and crossed his arms and legs.

Penny leant forward, reaching for one of her husband’s hands—which he, reluctantly, gave to her, though she was the one who found herself rubbing her thumb in his hand to comfort him. “It’s no use pretending it doesn’t exist, Tom. I know now, and I am very, very annoyed at you for not telling me. I ask you, having to bully it out of one of your pilot officers!”

“Yes, well,” he stammered, at least having the honesty to look sheepish.

“Shall we agree, to begin with, you should have told me? I shouldn’t have had to find out as I did?” Tom nodded his agreement. “Good. So, how is it? I assume from the mood when I bring it up, you’re still grounded?”

“Until further notice,” Tom muttered, picking up his tea and frowning.

Sensing the conversation could easily turn sour and not wanting to spoil any of the precious time she could get with her husband, Penny moved from her chair and sat on his lap. Automatically, one of his arms snaked around her waist. The movement reminded her, as if she needed reminding, of the urgent matter she needed to discuss with him.

“Tom, can you lock the door?”

Though he raised a questioning eyebrow, Tom reached out a hand and turned the key in the door.

“Thanks.”

“What’s wrong?” he asked, searching her face as she turned on his lap, the better to face him.

Taking a deep, steadying breath, Penny looked him square in the eyes. “How do you feel about children?”