Bombs on Aunt Dainty (10 page)

Anna could not think what to do, so she went over to the window and peered out into the dusk. The sun had not quite set and she could see that the sky was still overcast. If it was like this in London it shouldn’t be too bad. She thought of Mama and Papa getting ready for the night. They would be wondering whether to spend it in the cellar or to risk sleeping in their beds.

Behind her, a voice cried, “And it was just the same last week over the wellington boots!” and suddenly she wondered what on earth she was doing in this house, at this time, among these people.

All the days at the Professor’s house, Anna discovered, were much like the first one. There were long periods of boredom which she filled as best she could with walks and attempts to draw, interspersed with violent rows. Except for the Professor none of the house guests had anything to do except to wait for the next meal, the news, the end of the blitz, and as only the two boys ever seemed to leave the house, they all got on each others’ nerves.

It was extraordinary, thought Anna, what little things could start an argument – for instance the business over God Save The King. This cropped up almost every time the radio was on and seemed quite insoluble.

It began one evening when Aunt Louise leapt to her feet and stood to attention while God Save The King was being played after the news. Afterwards she told all the people who had remained seated that they were guilty of rudeness and ingratitude to the country that was giving them shelter. The Professor’s sister said her sons had reliably informed her that no Englishman would ever dream of standing up for God Save The King in his own home, and as usual there
was a row and everyone took sides.

Anna tried to avoid the whole issue by arranging not to be in the drawing room after the news when God Save The King was most likely to be played, but the situation was made more complicated by the fact that Aunt Louise was tone-deaf. She was never quite sure whether any rousing tune she heard was really God Save The King or not, and once tried to make everyone stand up for Rule Britannia, and twice for Land Of Hope And Glory.

Then there was the great mystery of the sugar ration. This was started, needless to say, by the old lady who had been complaining for some time that her sugar ration was being tampered with, but no one took any notice until she gave a triumphant cry one morning at breakfast and said that she had proof.

To avoid arguments, the sugar rations, like the butter and margarine rations, were carefully weighed out once a week into separate little dishes, each marked with the owner’s name, and the dishes were put out by Lotte on the breakfast table for people either to eke out day by day or devour all at once in one greedy feast. The old lady had cunningly marked the level of her sugar with pencil on the side of the dish, and now here it was, a good quarter of an inch lower. Roused to suspicion, the others marked their sugar also and, lo and behold, next day both the Professor’s sister and the red-haired lady’s husband had lost some, though everyone else’s remained untouched.

The ensuing row was bitterer than any Anna had yet
witnessed. The red-haired lady accused the two boys, the Professor’s sister cried, “Are you suggesting that they’d steal from their own mother?” which, Anna thought, showed a strange attitude, and Aunt Louise insisted that the Professor must interrogate the servants, as a result of which Lotte and Inge gave notice again.

The mystery was eventually cleared up. Fraulein Pimke, in the course of providing sweet puddings for dinner, had helped herself to the nearest dishes at hand. But so many unforgivable things had been said that almost no one was on speaking terms with anyone else for two days. The maharajah, as the only member of the household to remain aloof from the battle, found it very depressing. He and Anna walked glumly round the park under the dripping trees and Anna listened while he talked wistfully about India, until the cold autumn air drove them back into the house.

It was after the row about the sugar that Anna decided to return to London. She put it as tactfully as she could to Aunt Louise.

“Mama needs me,” she said, though Mama hadn’t actually said so.

Even so, Aunt Louise was quite distressed. She did not want Anna to go back into the air raids and also she thought it might upset Fraulein Pimke who had become used to seeing her about the house. And what about the maids, she said. If they really left she would need all the help she could get. But characteristically, just as Anna was
beginning to feel rather cross, she flung her arms about her, crying, “I’m a fool, don’t take any notice of me,” and insisted on giving her a pound for the journey.

The Professor was not driving up to London that week, so Anna went by train, which took four and a half hours instead of the scheduled fifty minutes. She had deliberately not told Mama that she was coming because Mama and Papa had both urged her in their letters to stay in the country as long as possible, and she did not want to give them the chance to argue with her.

As the train drew into London she could see gaps in almost every street where bombs had fallen, and there were no windows left in any of the houses backing on to the railway line. Paddington Station had lost all the grimy glass in its roof and it was strange to be able to see sky and clouds beyond the blackened girders. Some sparrows were fluttering in and out among them, swooping down every so often to the platforms in search of crumbs.

The streets were empty – it was early afternoon and everyone was at work – and, from her bus crawling along the Euston Road Anna noticed that weeds had begun to grow on some of the bomb-sites, which made them look as though they had been there for years. Altogether the city looked scarred but undramatic, as though it had become used to being bombed.

In Bedford Terrace almost half the houses had been boarded up and abandoned, but the Hotel Continental did not seem to have suffered any further damage and some of
the windows had even been repaired. She found Papa in his room – Mama was still at her office – in the middle of typing something on his shaky typewriter.

“Why didn’t you stay in the country?” he cried, but since she was there and there was nothing he could do about it, he was clearly delighted to see her. Mama’s reaction, an hour or two later, was much the same. Neither of them seemed altogether surprised. Of course, thought Anna, they knew the Rosenbergs a good deal better than she did.

There were fewer people than ever in the hotel. The German lady, Mama told her, had not been able to stop crying after that very bad night in the cellar, and in the end a doctor had sent her to a charitable institution in the country where she would be looked after until her nerves recovered. The porter, too, had left, to stay with his brother in Leicester, and so had many of the staff and guests. The ones who remained looked grey-faced and weary, even though Mama and Papa insisted that since the changeable autumn weather they were getting quite a lot of sleep.

Supper was almost a family affair. The Woodpigeon made a little speech to welcome Anna back. “Though you are a foolish girl,” he said, “for not staying in the beautiful countrysides with the sheeps and the grasses.”

“Really, Mr Woodpigeon,” said Frau Gruber who could pronounce his name no more than anyone else, “your English is getting worse each day.”

The air-raid warning did not sound until sometime after dark and Mama waved it aside contemptuously.

“They won’t come tonight,” she said. “There’s too much cloud.”

“I don’t see how you can be so sure,” said Papa, but everyone else seemed ready to accept Mama as an expert, and it was decided not to sleep in the cellar.

Anna found that she had been given a room on the first floor, next to Mama. (“No point in sleeping under the roof when the whole hotel is empty,” said Frau Gruber.) She had been worried that she might get very frightened again during the night, but her rest in the country must have done her good, for the few bumps which woke her did not trouble her at all, and even the following night which had to be spent in the cellar was not too bad.

When she returned to the secretarial school she found that it had acquired a new air of purposeful activity. Madame Laroche, thinner and more excitable than ever, had taken over the reins again and her incomprehensible Belgian accent could be heard in every classroom. There was paper for the machines again – someone had unearthed an English source of supply – and there were even some new students.

No one talked about air raids any more. They had become part of everyday life and were no longer interesting. Instead, all the talk was about jobs. There was a sudden demand for shorthand typists since London had come to terms with the bombing, and Madame Laroche had pinned up a list of vacant positions on a notice board in the corridor.

“How soon do you think I could get a job?” Anna asked her, and to her delight she replied something that sounded like “get back into practice” followed by “a few weeks”. In fact, Anna’s shorthand came back to her very quickly and one morning, about ten days after her return, she said proudly to Mama, “I’m going to ring up about a job from school today. So if anyone asks me to go for an interview I may be home late.” She felt very grand saying this, and as soon as the first lesson was over she made for the school telephone with a copy of Madame Laroche’s list and a shilling’s worth of pennies.

The best jobs were at the War Office. A girl Anna knew had just been taken on there at three pounds ten shillings a week, and she only spoke mediocre French. So what wouldn’t they pay someone like herself, thought Anna, with perfect French and German? And indeed, when she rang up and explained her qualifications the voice at the other end sounded enthusiastic.

“Absolutely splendid,” it cried in a military sort of way. “Can you come round at o-eleven hundred hours for an interview?”

“Yes,” said Anna, and one part of her was still trying to work out what on earth was meant by o-eleven hundred hours while another part was announcing to Mama that she had a job at four pounds or even four pounds ten a week, when the voice said as an afterthought, “I take it that you’re British-born?”

“No,” said Anna, “I was born in Germany, but my father …”

“Sorry,” said the voice, several degrees cooler. “Only British-born applicants can be considered.”

“But we’re anti-Nazi!” cried Anna, “We’ve been anti-Nazis long before anyone else!”

“Sorry,” said the voice. “Regulations – nothing I can do.” And it rang off.

How idiotic, thought Anna. She was so disappointed that it took her some time before she could rouse herself to ring up the Ministry of Information, which was her second choice, but the reply she received was the same. No one could be considered unless they were British-born.

Surely, she thought with a sinking feeling in her stomach, everyone can’t have that rule, but it appeared that they did. There were six large organisations on Madame Laroche’s list, all appealing for secretaries, and none would even grant her an interview. After the last one had refused her she stood for a moment by the telephone, completely at a loss. Then she went to see Madame Laroche.

“Madame,” she said, “you told me that I would get a job at the end of this course, but none of the people on your list will even see me because I’m not British.”

Madame Laroche’s reply was difficult to follow as usual. The regulations about British nationality were new – or perhaps they were not new, but Madame Laroche had hoped that by now they might have been waived. Whatever it was, the one thing to emerge clearly was that it was hopeless for Anna to go on trying.

“But Madame,” said Anna, “I must have a job. That
was my one reason for coming here. You told me that I would get a job, and I told my mother this morning …” She stopped, for what she had told Mama was really nothing to do with it, but even so she had the greatest difficulty in keeping her composure.

“Well, there’s nothing I can do about it now,” said Madame Laroche unhelpfully in French, whereupon Anna, to her surprise, heard herself say, “But you’ll have to!”

“Comment?”
said Madame Laroche, looking at her with dislike.

Anna stared back at her.

Madame Laroche mumbled something under her breath and began to rummage among the papers on her desk. Finally, she extracted one and muttered something about a cross, red colonel.

“Won’t he object to my nationality?” asked Anna, but Madame Laroche thrust the piece of paper into her hand and cried, “Go! Go! Ring up at once!”

Back at the telephone Anna looked at the paper. It said The Hon. Mrs Hammond, Colonel of the British Red Cross Society, and gave an address off the Vauxhall Bridge Road. She borrowed two more pennies and dialled the number. The voice that answered was gruff and brisk, but it did not ask whether she was British-born and suggested that she should come for an interview that afternoon.

She spent the rest of the day in fidgety anticipation. She wondered whether to ring Mama and let her know that she was going for an interview but decided not to, in case
nothing came of it. At lunch she could not face her usual meal of a bun and a cup of tea at Lyons and wandered about the streets instead, eyeing her reflection in the few remaining shop windows and worrying whether she looked sufficiently like a secretary. At last, when the time arrived, she got there far too early and had to walk up and down the Vauxhall Bridge Road for the best part of half an hour.

It was not a very attractive neighbourhood. There was a brewery at one end and the sour smell of hops pervaded the entire district. Trams shrieked and clattered along the middle of the road. All the shops had been boarded up and abandoned.

Mrs Hammond’s office turned out to be a little apart from all this, in a bomb-damaged hospital overlooking a large square, and after the noise of the main road it seemed very quiet when Anna finally rang her bell. She was admitted by a woman in an overall who led her through a vast, dark place which must have been one of the wards, through a smaller brightly-lit room where half a dozen elderly women were rattling away on sewing machines and to a tiny office where the Hon. Mrs Hammond was sitting stoutly behind a desk surrounded by skeins of wool. Her grey hair was covered with fluff and the wool seemed to have climbed all over her, hanging from her chair and her blue uniformed lap and lying in coils on the floor.

“Damn these things!” she cried as Anna came in. “I’ve lost count of them again. Are you any good at arithmetic?”

Anna said she thought so and Mrs Hammond said,
“Jolly good. And what else can you do?” causing Anna to list her accomplishments from her School Certificate results to her ability to take down shorthand in three languages. As she went nervously through them Mrs Hammond’s face fell.