Night of Triumph (7 page)

It was a storeroom. There were boxes, and files of discarded paperwork. These had to be heaved out of the way by Colin.

Presently, the men found what they were looking for: a dusty old hanger-rail, running on castors at either end, of the sort that you might find in a dry cleaner’s, or a tailor’s, or
anyone in the rag trade. It had two coat-hangers, of which one had a set of blue overalls, and an ARP helmet hanging by its chinstrap: white with a single diamond. Mr Ware took his uniform down,
rolled it up, and thoughtfully put it in a bag. He wasn’t sure exactly when he was going to need this.

The other hanger held something longer and fuller, something concealed under a paper cover which was intended to protect it from dust. It was Colin who peeled this back to check that everything
was all right under there.

‘Your gown, madame?’ said Mr Ware.

‘Yes,’ said Colin quietly. Something about this rich and exotic garment restored some of Colin’s confidence, and in fact Mr Ware became more respectful as well, standing
back.

‘Everything ship-shape about it?’ he asked.

‘Oh, perfectly.’

‘I had it taken in, just as you asked.’

‘Thank you.’

‘Not that you needed it. It’s not as if you’ve gained weight.’

‘Well,’ said Colin judiciously, with a you-can’t-be-too-careful tone.

‘Did you want to try it on?’ asked Mr Ware, now almost humble.

‘No,’ said Colin, ‘that’s all right. We’ll wait until later.’

‘Right-o.’

‘I suppose I could sketch out some of the dance steps.’

Forty-five minutes later, both men reappeared in the bar, dusty and subdued. Ginnie beamed over at them; she was now helping out with the serving of drinks. The place was a bit more crowded.

‘Everything all right?’ she called out.

Mr Ware did not reply. His sour mood had evidently returned. It was for Colin to say that, yes, yes, everything was present and correct. Mr Ware had his ARP bundle under his arm. Colin’s
earlobe still throbbed red.

‘I suppose you chaps know Rupert?’

They saw a handsome, younger man sitting at the bar, a double whisky in front of him. He looked up and smiled coolly. They had not been introduced.

‘This is Rupert,’ said Ginnie, unconsciously patting the back of her hair, pushing it springily into the scalp behind both ears in turn. ‘He’s one of my most loyal
customers in the Brown Bomber.’ This was Ginnie’s other Soho club.

Rupert stood up and put out his hand to Mr Ware to shake, and then to Colin.

‘Delighted,’ he said. ‘Brook. Rupert Brook.’

‘With –
out
the ‘e’, chaps,’ said Ginnie. ‘And Rupert is being too modest. He’s not in uniform tonight, but he is in fact Group Captain Rupert
Brook. Of the RAF.’

Rupert smiled tolerantly, as if he really couldn’t approve of Ginnie’s extravagant praise.

‘The Few,’ said Ginnie reverently. ‘One of The Few.’

Brook was a handsome man with a fleshy, placid face, which appeared to crease easily into a beaming smile – as it did now. He wore a chalkstripe suit whose shoulders were dusted with
dandruff; his tie bore some crest or other.

‘Ginnie,’ he said, in a voice slower and more languid than the others’, ‘I was wondering if I couldn’t possibly get something to eat from that kitchen of
yours?’

‘Right you are, Group Captain!’

Brook made a small
moue
of exasperation at her flattery.

‘And perhaps these gentlemen would like to join me in some snack or other ...?’ he ventured.

‘I could do you all a jolly filling sausage sandwich each.’

‘Marvellous. Does that sound up to the mark, chaps?’ he asked.

Colin thanked him heartily, but Mr Ware, though unwilling to pass the offer up, was reluctant to put himself in this man’s debt.

‘Now, remind me,’ said Group Captain Brook, ‘what is it you do, again?’

‘I am – I was – an ARP warden,’ said Mr Ware stoutly.

‘Ah, yes. But in civilian life?’

‘I was a builder.’

‘Ah. Jolly good. And what about you, Colin?’

‘I’m in the wine trade. Was before the War, anyway. Now I really don’t know.’

‘Well, Ginnie tells me that you have theatrical interests. I expect they’ll be keeping you busy, won’t they?’

‘Oh yes.’

Presently, their sausage sandwiches arrived and all three men started chomping away. Group Captain Brook did not remove his jacket, but contrived to keep his sleeves entirely free of grease.

‘I myself had interests in a couple of West End shows in ’38. They did remarkably well. I turned a pretty penny without lifting a finger. And people want entertainment now more than
ever. There’s a nice little theatrical pie I’ve got my finger into now, actually. Of course, there’s room for investors of the right sort.’

Brook let that remark hang in the air. Mr Ware was too suspicious to follow it up, and Colin Erskine-Jones too gloomy and too poor.

‘Well, cheer-o,’ said Brook, lifting his whisky, draining it, and then with a tap of his finger on the glass, followed by a circular teaspoon-stirring movement in the air, indicated
that he would like another and intended to buy the others theirs as well. A raised eyebrow in their direction solicited the information that they would like whiskies. Brook mouthed the word
‘whiskies’ in the direction of the bar.

‘Jolly good work you’re doing in the ARP, Ware,’ Brook now said thoughtfully. ‘Jolly
hard
work, too, come to that.’

‘Well, it was difficult work, but somebody had to do it,’ said Ware. Colin remained silent, although Ware’s observation could as well have applied to him.

‘Really thankless stuff,’ continued Brook, as if the subject was so extraordinary, so riveting, he simply couldn’t leave it alone. ‘Badly paid. Unpaid, actually. And of
course as there are still bombsites and unsafe areas ...?’

Mr Ware’s eyes, as he now looked at Group Captain Brook, had the shuttered, opaque quality of a guard dog at heel. He was silent in a way that made Colin squirm with discomfiture, but
Brook remained entirely open, candid and cheerful.

‘Ginnie’s been telling me all about the hard work you’ve been doing – and the
risks
you’ve been taking.’

Both Ware and Colin, entirely independently, turned around to see where Ginnie was. But she had evidently disappeared.

‘Because it’s a risky business. Unlike my business. Did Ginnie tell you what my business is?’

Mr Ware turned back to Brook and neither nodded nor shook his head.

‘It’s antiques. Furniture. And jewellery,’ Brook prattled on. ‘I deal with all sorts of valuables. Large and small. Commonplace and rare. I buy and I sell. And I can act
as an agent. I can handle a lot of material and I can place it with buyers who are not burdened with – how shall I say? – a neurotic insistence on knowing the provenance of each piece.
Do you understand what I mean?’

Ginnie chose this moment to reappear with the whiskies. She set the tray down, and just as Group Captain Brook was reaching into his pocket, Mr Ware forestalled him with a downward-palm gesture,
and produced a ten-shilling note himself. He was smiling.

Running had been, on this second occasion, easier but less fun; the novelty had dwindled and Elizabeth had been relieved when they all decided they had eluded the pursuer, who
was probably not in the slightest bit serious about the chase. The four were now much further up, in the crowds near Trafalgar Square.

In her heart, Elizabeth considered that it was high time they returned to the Palace. This had, surely, been quite enough. She was secretly amazed at the extraordinary things that they had done
– that she had done! Not only stealing a policeman’s helmet – well, Margaret had done that – but wearing it and leading an impromptu sing-song. Incredible! Elizabeth was
almost overcome with euphoria thinking about this wonderful
coup
, but knew that it would not entirely overwhelm her until she was back inside, safe, chattering about it with her sister, with
Bobo, even with her father!

There were two people that she knew she couldn’t regale with these stories. One was the Queen who, although by no means humourless, could never countenance these shenanigans. The other was
Philip. With absolute clarity, Elizabeth foresaw in detail the puzzlement and irritated resentment with which he would react. A piece of mannish daring and high-jinks in which he had not been
present – which, indeed, could never have happened had he been present? Oh dear, no. He would not laugh and clap his hands delightedly, as Elizabeth imagined the King doing. On the contrary.
He would be furious. It might well colour the vital first months of their married life together. And this was not even taking into account the presence of two unmarried young Guards officers,
squiring the Princesses around. There was of course no question of impropriety, but shrewdly, anxiously, Elizabeth assessed this as a matter of status and
amour propre
. She wondered if
Philip would take offence, and refuse to forgive these two officers for giving his fiancée such an unforgettable night on the tiles. Should she refuse to give their names, if he pressed her?
Should she claim that she and Margaret had been out on their own? Or with other people entirely?

No. That wouldn’t do. The only thing was simply not to tell him at all. But wouldn’t he find out from the King?

‘Do come along, Lilibet,’ said Margaret. ‘What shall we do now? I say, shall we go for a drink somewhere?’

Elizabeth knew that this insouciant pose, this casual talk of going for a drink, was all nonsense. Margaret had of course never gone for a drink anywhere in her life. She had only this Christmas
been permitted wine. Elizabeth herself did not like the taste, all that much.

Suddenly, from nowhere, Elizabeth conceived an overwhelming irritation with Margaret and these two gallants who were dancing attendance on her sister and making her feel excluded and unwanted;
for a second, a profound and contemptuous uninterest in the two men’s lives swept over her and she wished all three would just go anywhere, go away.

‘We might go to the Ritz, Your Royal Highness,’ murmured Hugh. He was talking to Margaret.

‘Oh, do let’s!’ said Margaret.

The three of them turned questioningly to Elizabeth, and she was wasp-stung with irritation to realise that they were not asking for her opinion, but merely her permission.

‘It really is getting awfully crowded,’ Hugh presumed to add, as if to hurry her.

It was. The crowd, though still entirely cheerful, was densely packed, and moving anywhere required turning sideways and presenting one’s shoulder. Conversations had to be conducted at a
shout. To Margaret’s obvious exasperation, Elizabeth still did not say anything. Standing there was becoming uncomfortable. But then something happened which made their minds up for them.
From a distance, she could a hear a crowd beginning to sing ‘Knees Up Mother Brown’, and the raucous song appeared to be taken up by people nearer and nearer to them. And the crowd
seemed to be reforming, quite oddly, lining up like iron filings when a magnet is brought close. An old man quite near Elizabeth put his hands – rather lasciviously, Elizabeth thought –
on the hips of a pretty young woman in front of him, and didn’t appear to react when a middle-aged woman put her hands on his hips. They were singing ‘Knees Up Mother Brown’,
too.

‘A conga line!’ squealed Margaret. ‘Come on, Lilibet!’

Reluctantly, Elizabeth placed her hands very lightly on the hips of the young man in front who had joined this uproarious musical queue – or rather, higher, nearer the small of his back.
Margaret put her hands on her hips. Glancing back, she noticed that Hugh had put his hands on Margaret’s hips, and supposed that Peter had placed his hands on Hugh’s. They started
moving off, part of the long ungainly human snake that had started to jog towards Admiralty Arch, and was perhaps at this moment going round and round Nelson’s Column.

As quickly as it had arisen, Elizabeth’s silent bad temper vanished. Actually, this was fun! The dancing aspect of the whole thing was just a matter of rocking from side to side and
kicking out one’s feet occasionally. Much less demanding than the reels at Balmoral over Christmas, but just as vigorous. Under the table you will go!

When they reached the end of the song, everyone just seemed happy to go back to the beginning again. After a while, they changed to ‘We’ll Hang Out Our Washing on the Siegfried
Line’. Elizabeth was getting rather puffed, but was still perfectly happy. She looked ahead, and wondered if the conga line was going all the way up Whitehall. And behind her, did it stretch
all the way down to the Palace and back to Victoria? Was there some fleeting, ecstatic moment in which everyone in London was connected up in one vast conga line? Black-cab drivers, after studying
The Knowledge, were supposed to be vouchsafed a vision in which they could ‘see it’, see the entirety of London’s streets in their heads, all at once. Elizabeth wondered if she
was experiencing something similar.

It was odd, though, this conga line business. When
was
it going to end? And wasn’t it strange not facing the person you were dancing with? That was what happened with normal dances.
And with all other group things, such as a reel, or a Dashing White Sergeant, there were boundaries, conventions, regulations.

‘Margo!’ Elizabeth called experimentally over her shoulder, and then thought to disguise her voice. ‘Margo!’ she growled in an absurdly low Scottish accent, and giggled.
It was a pointless precaution. Nobody could hear a word in this crush and din. So she turned around to talk to her.

But Margaret wasn’t there. The person behind her was a plump, middle-aged woman, wearing a porridgey overcoat that bulged and split at three points down the front where she had done up the
buttons. This woman winked and grinned at Elizabeth, who did her best to grin back, but then instantly turned round to face front, pale. Where on earth were Margaret, Hugh and Peter? And where was
she now, anyway? Fortunately, the looming landmark of Admiralty Arch gave the answer to that question. But where on earth were the others? Elizabeth wondered if she dared turn around again or call
out for them, and risk being recognised.