Chapter Ten

“Why’re trains never on time in this country?” Doris moaned, as they stepped off onto Waterloo’s platform, immediately getting jostled by a multitude of civilians and service people from all walks of life and from all over the world.

“Be fair,” Thelma said, rubbing her upper arm where a Lee-Enfield rifle had banged against her as it slipped off the shoulder of some private who didn’t even notice. “We’re only late because of some army convoy crossing in front of the train.”

Doris skipped rapidly back to avoid getting an army boot on her foot, yelled at the back of the officer who’d nearly crippled her, “Watch where the hell you’re going!” and promptly returned his stare with venom. If he wanted to get into a shouting match, neither Betty nor Thelma fancied his chances. Once he’d decided discretion was the better part of valor, she answered Thelma in typical Doris fashion, “And that’s an excuse for not checking the train timetable?”

Betty kept quiet and slipped into step behind her two escorts. She knew the main reason for Doris’s bad temper. They’d deliberately got on an early train from Hamble, knowing there were likely to be delays and wanting plenty of time to spare before Betty’s appointment.

However, there were delays, and there were delays. Leaving Southampton late had cost them twenty minutes, and some cows which had managed to get onto the line took another fifteen. The unexpected army convoy was what had cost them the best part of an hour, which had led to all their frayed nerves. Doris, though, wasn’t one for keeping what she was feeling inside, and it seemed anyone who got in her way, at least if the train station crowd was anything to go by, was going to get informed what she thought of them. A quick discussion the previous evening about whether or not to go in uniform had ended up with Betty casting the deciding vote. She was very glad they were in civvies now, as otherwise she’d have half expected complaints to eventually wind up on Jane’s desk.

“If you step on my foot one more time!” Doris was squaring up to a Royal Navy sailor who must have been a foot taller than she was, if he was an inch. He’d made the mistake of actually stepping on Doris’s foot. Thelma had dropped back to stand next to Betty, though she had an expression of great amusement upon her face. When Betty looked behind the outhouse-sized sailor, his friends seemed to have similar looks. Everyone, especially Doris’s opponent, could see he was in a no-win situation. Nobody in their right mind would challenge this chap to a fight—half his left ear was missing, and he had a vivid red burn covering most of his neck.

“You’ll what?” he replied, obviously deciding he needed to take part in the confrontation, though equally obviously not wanting to do anything physical to the diminutive woman before him.

Doris took another step forward. She was now nose-to-collarbone. “Or I’ll chew your ankles off!”

To be fair to the sailor, he was smarter than he looked—this wasn’t difficult—and at hearing her words, he immediately creased up with laughter, swiftly joined by his mates. Sweeping off his cap, he took two steps back, then bowed and swept the cap downward in one swift motion. “Please, accept the apology of this humble servant of His Majesty’s Royal Navy.”

Every one of his mates made the same gesture with their caps, and in delight Doris clapped her hands together and grabbed the large sailor around the neck as he made to straighten up. “Apology accepted, my good man,” she added in a terrible attempt to impersonate an upper-class English lady.

“Some film star’s going to try the same awful accent one of these days and is going to be slaughtered!” Thelma declared, shaking her head.

Doris didn’t appear to hear her as, by now, she was gallantly accepting a handshake and a swift kiss on the cheek from each of the sailors. As they turned to go, all waving heartily, she called after them, “Keep yourselves safe, boys!” a sentiment both Betty and Thelma greatly agreed with, so joined in the waving.

By the time this strange incident had happily passed, there was a temporary lull in the crowds, and they were able to make their way toward the Underground without further incident. “It’s a very good thing Walter wasn’t here,” Betty commented.

They found where they needed to go, a short walk once they got off the Piccadilly Line from Knightsbridge. The Martins Bank of Lowndes Street located on Sloane Street didn’t look too hard to find.

Accepting her ticket, Doris cheerily told them as she made toward the escalators, “He’d have made mincemeat of him!” Betty and Thelma both stumbled upon hearing this and had to hurry to catch their American friend up. “Come on,” she shouted. “We’re going to be late unless we get a move on.”

****

They would have been late, too, if they hadn’t been able to drag Doris away from the twinkling delights of Harvey Nichols. November in wartime or not, the store was doing its very best to pull in the customers from the bleak London streets. Only by promising the American they would pop into the store later did she allow herself to be led away, though not without the odd wistful glance over her shoulder.

According to Thelma’s watch, after they’d backtracked up Sloane Street having missed their turn from Lowndes Street and sighted the sign for Martins Bank, they had five minutes to spare until Betty’s appointment. Opening the door, they were met by a woman in her early fifties, dressed in the off-bottle-green uniform of the Women’s Voluntary Service.

Holding out her hand somewhere in the middle of the threesome, she ventured, “Ms. Palmer?”

“Betty,” she replied, taking the proffered hand and shaking it briefly before following her to a little area set aside for interviews and minor meetings.

“Forgive the rather cramped conditions,” Mrs. Potter said after introducing herself. “We’ve not as much room here as we used to, but we’ll make do. Would your friends care to join us?”

Betty turned her head and raised an enquiring eyebrow at them both.

Thelma shook her head, knowing this was something Betty should at least try to get through on her own. “We’ll be here if you need us,” she informed her, taking Doris by the arm and steering her to some free seats against the far wall.

Betty nodded her understanding and jutted her chin out a little more as she took the seat before Mrs. Potter’s desk.

“You’ve brought the items to prove your identity?” she asked Betty without preamble.

Not feeling much in the mood for small talk either, Betty took out an envelope from her bag and pushed it across the desk. Taking the papers out, Mrs. Potter spent a few minutes studying them and comparing the information on them against what her records showed. Apparently satisfied, she looked up and smiled. “Well, all seems to be in order. I assume you’d like to see the contents?”

Betty’s gift of speech seemed to have deserted her, so she nodded, got to her feet, and followed the WVS lady through a door and down a short corridor to another door. Once that was unlocked, they found inside a simple wooden table. Taking a set of keys from her pocket, Mrs. Potter held them up before her until she came to the one she wanted.

“Do you have your key, please?” she asked.

Betty took her small brass key out and passed it across.

Comparing the two, Mrs. Potter frowned before looking across at Betty. “Were you aware the ID number on this key’s been very carefully filed off?”

Not willing to reveal anything about her sister if she could avoid it, Betty shrugged and was happy to find she wasn’t asked for any more information. Without further ado, she was handed her key back.

“Well,” Mrs. Potter told her, “let’s open up.”

So saying, she turned her back and bent to insert her copy of the key. A moment later, she straightened and laid a long, narrow steel box on the table. Stepping back, Mrs. Potter said to Betty, “I’ll just step outside the door. Please knock when you’ve finished, and I’ll come back in and lock the box away.”

“Thank you,” Betty managed, finding her voice.

Once she’d gone, Betty laid her hands on the lid, stroking the metal as if to do so she could communicate with Eleanor, so she could tell her what she was going to find without actually opening the lid. When this failed to work, she took a deep breath and lifted the lid. Whatever she’d been expecting—jewels, cash, the odd rolled-up stolen master painting—didn’t materialize. Instead, all she could see was a single piece of white paper with her name scrawled in her sister’s copperplate script.

Taking it out, she couldn’t resist the urge to thrust her hand inside the box and then, when this revealed nothing else, she tipped it upside down. This didn’t reveal anything else either. Unfolding the paper, Betty began to read.

****

Ten minutes later, Betty had dragged everyone into a tea shop, shushing Doris into silence when she complained about it not being Harvey Nichols.

“I need a little time, Doris,” Betty told her, leading her and Thelma to a table in a corner and ordering a pot of tea and three cups from a passing waitress as she went.

Once they’d settled and Doris had been persuaded of their impending visit to the department store, Betty took out the piece of paper she’d taken from the deposit box and laid it before them.

Thelma reached out and, when Betty didn’t object, pulled it toward her and turned it over, though she didn’t open it. “Is this all?”

Betty pursed her lips. “That’s all.” The tea then arrived, so they waited for the waitress to leave before Betty took the paper back and opened it out.

Thelma and Doris both read what was there, looked at each other, and then each took up the paper and re-read it.

You are not alone!

Contact a solicitor called Alistair Burrows, London.

As the three made their way out of the bank, heads close together in deep conversation, none of them noticed that the smartly tailored man who’d held the door open for them was following them as they strode back toward the underground station.