April and Paula were deep in the sweltering confines of a motor gun boat’s hull, struggling to unscrew a bolt that seemed determined not to budge. They’d oiled it, hit it, used every ounce of strength they possessed to try and turn it, but it was stuck fast, and it was with a sense of frustration that they had to accept it had defeated them.
‘Now what?’ April brushed her filthy hand over her forehead to clear the sweat, knowing she was probably leaving a great smear of grease behind, but not caring.
‘I don’t know,’ sighed Paula, slumping against the hull. ‘But if we don’t get that loose, we can’t finish the service – and those plugs definitely need changing.’
April could feel the sweat beading her top lip and she smeared it away. ‘We’ll give it one more go and if that fails, I suppose we’ll have to get a man to do it,’ she said wearily.
‘If we do that we’ll never hear the end of it,’ muttered Paula, attacking the bolt with sturdy pliers.
‘I know they’re only teasing,’ said April, ‘but it does do their ego a lot of good when they have to help us poor, feeble women out.’ She placed her hands over Paula’s and they both tugged as hard as they could.
‘Bloody thing,’ muttered Paula, giving it a hefty whack with the pliers. ‘Move, damn it. Bloody well move, will you?’ she snarled.
‘What seems to be the problem down here, sailors?’
Paula and April exchanged frustrated glances as the boatswain blocked out the light and came down into the hull to glare at them. He was a big man, as wide as he was tall, with a fierce black beard and bushy eyebrows. All the girls were wary of him, for he was inclined to roar his displeasure and loom over them.
‘We can’t get this bolt to shift, sir,’ said April reluctantly.
The man rolled his eyes and gave an exasperated sigh. ‘That’s the problem with getting women to do a man’s work,’ he grumbled. ‘Not enough muscle.’
He snatched the wrench from Paula and with two short twists had the bolt out. He dropped it into her hand and smirked. ‘There,’ he said. ‘Wasn’t so hard, was it?’
‘Thank you, sir,’ they replied in unison, although it was shaming how easily he’d managed it after they’d spent at least half an hour trying to shift the blasted thing.
‘Get on with your work then,’ he barked. ‘We need this boat tonight – not in a week’s time.’
April glanced at Paula and they quickly returned to the task in hand, both aware of him leaning against the bulkhead and watching their every move. It was a tight enough squeeze in here without his great body taking up so much room, and both of them knew that his critical eyes would miss nothing.
They did their best to ignore him and finished cleaning and changing the plugs, checked the wiring, the fuel lines and the level of oil, then bolted everything back in place. The sweat was running freely down their faces and soaking their hair and their overalls, but with him standing there smirking, it was a matter of pride to ignore the discomfort and get on with their job.
‘All finished and ready for inspection, sir,’ said April, wiping her filthy hands on an equally filthy rag.
He nodded and without a word went up the ladder to the wheelhouse.
April and Paula grabbed their gas-mask boxes, tool-bags and caps and swiftly followed him, eager to get away from the heat and the stink of oil and high-octane petrol fumes. The air on deck was clean and fresh and they both took great gulps of it as the bosun turned on the engine and listened to its steady burble.
‘That’s fine,’ he said almost grudgingly before switching it off again. ‘See you tomorrow.’
They saluted him and hurried up the ladder to the dock, eager to get washed and changed so they could have supper. It had been a long, tiring day, with countless interruptions by the Luftwaffe who seemed determined to swoop in at the most inconvenient moments and cause havoc, and they were starving.
April did her best to keep up with Paula, but she was feeling a bit light-headed and sick after the stench and heat of that engine room, and the corset she’d taken to wearing to disguise her burgeoning stomach was almost unbearably tight.
‘Are you all right?’ Paula stopped to let her catch up.
April nodded as she pushed back her sweaty hair and caught her breath. ‘I will be once I can get this corset off,’ she replied. ‘It feels as if it’s cutting me in half.’
Paula slowed her pace as they continued towards their billet. ‘It can’t be doing you or the baby any good,’ she murmured. ‘What does the doctor say?’
‘I don’t wear it when I go to see him for my check-ups,’ April admitted. ‘But everything’s fine, really, and at least the morning sickness is now a thing of the past.’
‘You won’t be able to hide it much longer, though,’ said Paula quietly as they approached HMS Firefly in the swiftly gathering gloom. ‘Another few weeks and no corset on this earth will mask it.’
April was all too aware of that, and could only pray that her bump stayed small and neat and didn’t swell up like a balloon for a while yet. ‘It’s a good thing we practically have to live in these,’ she said, plucking at the baggy overalls. ‘They hide everything, which is more than can be said for our uniform.’
They continued on in silence and were about to go through the front door when the sirens started to moan all through the city and the searchlights fizzed into life. ‘Damn and blast,’ muttered Paula. ‘There goes supper, and I’m absolutely ravenous.’
April was hungry, sweaty and uncomfortable too, but she needed the lavatory more than food and a wash. ‘I’ll catch up with you,’ she said, dashing indoors and racing to the downstairs loo as the other girls clattered down the stairs to the large, reinforced cellar which had once been the bar and hotel restaurant but now served as an emergency shelter.
She felt a good deal better as she emerged a few minutes later. The pressure on her bladder had eased and she’d used the opportunity to quickly loosen the sweat-soaked corset and have a delicious rub and scratch. She had no idea how her mother had survived all those years of wearing such a torturous garment, but it was sheer heaven to get the damn thing loose.
As she hurried through the main lounge she could see the searchlights weaving across the darkening sky and hear the drone of incoming aircraft above the shrieking sirens. Soon the big guns of the warships would boom out and the anti-aircraft guns would rattle off thousands of rounds, tracer fire stitching through the darkening sky as the brave boys from the RAF became embroiled in dogfights.
She hurried down the cellar steps, urged on by the petty officer who was impatient to close the reinforced door. The lights were dim within wire-mesh cages, the windows had been bricked up, and the only air came from a large vent which had been cut into the outside wall. It was a bleak, grim place even though the collection of old chairs and couches offered at least a bit of comfort during the long hours they’d had to spend in here.
There was a general moan about the no smoking, no alcohol rule, but there were books and magazines scattered about, a tea urn and a stock of biscuits and sandwiches which were a bit stale, but nevertheless, very welcome. The other drawback to being shut in down here for hours on end was the toilet facilities, for no matter how much they were scrubbed and disinfected the buckets behind the flimsy screens in the corner still stank, and April was not alone in avoiding them unless it was absolutely necessary.
She sank down beside Paula on the couch which had seen better days several decades before, and curled her arm around one of the moth-eaten cushions to camouflage the swell of her stomach which was more pronounced now the corset wasn’t holding it in. She could feel the mysterious and rather wonderful flutter of the baby moving inside her and she lived with the fear that her subterfuge might be damaging it.
She struggled to resist the almost driving need to run her hand protectively over her bump, for she also had to contend with the absolute terror of being discovered. There had been an extremely tricky moment at the naval stores when she’d gone to buy a replacement skirt in a larger size. The girl had given her a long, hard look before handing one over, and April had made some stupid joke about having suddenly discovered a liking for beer which had brought about this necessity.
There had been other moments when some of the girls had noticed her fuller breasts, and had teased her about giving Hedy Lamarr a run for her money in the bosom department, and times when a remark was jokingly made about her putting on a bit of weight. From then on, April had become almost reclusive, spending her off duty hours in her cabin, and eating in the dining room after she knew most of the others had left for the night. It was exhausting having to be on her guard all the time, and there were instances when she longed to just own up and get the whole thing in the open. But she had very little money and not the least idea of what she would do once she was out of the navy, so she gritted her teeth and carried on.
‘I’ll get us a cuppa and a sandwich,’ said Paula. ‘You look all in.’
April smiled gratefully and closed her eyes as she nestled into the musty cushion. She could sleep for a week if only her worries would let her – but with the planes roaring overhead, the guns going off at sea and the crash and thump of bombs exploding, there was fat chance of any real rest tonight.
Paula returned with a mug of cocoa and a Spam sandwich that looked as if it had been made at least two days ago. ‘Beggars can’t be choosers,’ she sighed, ‘but I do wish the navy had a bit more imagination.’
April nodded her thanks, sipped the sweet cocoa and nibbled on the stale sandwich as the thunder of aircraft and the boom and rattle of guns impeded any further conversation. The walls trembled as a bomb exploded nearby and dust began to sift down from the cellar ceiling. The whine and zip of tracers mingled with the thud of flack and the whoosh of the pom-poms which April knew would be lighting up the sky and exposing the enemy bombers for the Allied gunners.
Another thud made the walls tremble and the ground shudder beneath their feet, but because they’d all experienced this before – and worse if they’d been caught out at sea – there were no cries of alarm, just a few sharp intakes of breath as everyone carried on reading, gossiping and drinking their tea. April burrowed deeper into the cushion as Paula went off to fetch another mug of tea and see if she could find a sandwich that was a bit more appetising.
April didn’t hear the explosion – and wasn’t aware that she’d been lifted from the couch as the blast ripped through the basement and dumped her unceremoniously on the other side of the cellar. She was unable to know that HMS Firefly was now no more than a lethal skeleton of toppling masonry which fell with inexorable purpose on those hidden in the cellar beneath it.