‘So, what did you do wrong?’
‘Wrong?’ asked Maddie. ‘I don’t follow.’ She looked at the young
woman beside her, who was also on her knees scrubbing the barrack room
floor. Déjà vu for Maddie. It didn’t seem that long ago since she’d been on
her knees scrubbing another flagstone floor.
‘You and me. Like bleedin’ parlour maids.’
‘It’s the army. They like to keep us busy with these little jobs. The devil
finds work for idle hands and all that.’ Maddie laughed. And why had she
said that, that stuff about the devil? She was beginning to sound like bloody
Matron.
‘But scrubbing it with a nail brush? That smacks of punishment.’
‘It’s called discipline,’ said Maddie.
‘Yeah? You see anybody else here doing the donkey work?’
‘Somebody’s got to do it,’ said Maddie, cheerfully. She was quite happy
with her lot. After all, she could easily have been picking up her discharge
papers.
‘Well, ain’t you a chirpy little thing?’ the girl said, and laughed. She
wiped a soapy hand on her overalls and stuck it out towards Maddie to
shake. ‘Me name’s Gertrude, Gertrude Wilson,’ she said, ‘but Gertie to me
pals.’
‘Delighted to meet you, Gertrude – Gertie,’ said Maddie. ‘I’m Madeline
Brady. Friends call me Maddie.’
‘And ain’t you posh? Chirpy and posh. Still, I got a feeling we’ll get on
right fine, Maddie Brady.’
‘Thanks, Gertie.’
‘I been here three weeks already, how come I ain’t seen you before?’
‘Just got here. I’m on a refresher course, three weeks’ basic instead of
six.’
‘They sent you back? Thought so. You been a naughty girl. What you
done then, Maddie?’
‘Nothing,’ said Maddie, quickly. ‘I’ve been sick. Been on extended sick
leave. I guess my officer thought I could use a refresher.’
‘I ain’t been nowhere yet – just here. But don’t reckon the sergeant likes
me, that’s why I got me a floor cleaning job with a nail brush.’
‘Just discipline,’ said Maddie. ‘It’s the army. They like to keep their
floors clean and…’
‘Somebody’s got to do it,’ they said together, and laughed.
They laughed a lot, she and Gertie. Not only in the barracks, but when they
went out with other recruits on a weekend pass. Gertie was a tiny bundle of
energy. There were some who got the wrong impression of her, dismissed
her because of her diminutive size. Others thought her a bit odd. But not
Maddie. Her new friend may have been small in stature, but her confidence
and personality were huge. And so was her heart. The underdog need never
fear if Gertie Wilson was in their corner.
Gertie was a Londoner, proud to be an East Ender born in Bethnal
Green. Molly had been an East Ender too, except she had done her best to
shake the dust of Hackney from her, glad to be away from her family’s
poverty, but still tugged back there by loyalty.
In some ways both women were alike. Confident, outspoken, practical.
Except for appearance, of course. Molly had been an attractive, big, bouncy
blonde. Sexy, though strangely unaware of the charismatic effect she had on
men. Gertie, on the other hand, could never have been called attractive, but
there was something about her confidence and that remarkable red hair of
hers that made her memorable. She was striking. Yes, that was the word.
And a large port wine stain on her neck that might have made other women
feel embarrassed was never an issue with Gertie.
Maddie thought her courageous but her new friend had dismissed the
idea. ‘What, me? Brave?’ She’d laughed at that. ‘I am what I am,’ she’d
told Maddie. ‘Why try to hide it with a stupid scarf? If people don’t like it,
if they want to be ignorant and stare, then that’s their problem. Why would I
make it mine?’ she’d asked.
But Gertrude was brave. And young. She’d be eighteen soon, she’d said
proudly. But, young as she was, life had already dealt her some blows. Her
mother had died giving birth to her, and her father was a merchant seaman
who’d drowned on one of the convoys in the North Atlantic. But she didn’t
wear the grief like a badge; instead, it seemed to have given her a maturity
far beyond her years and the confidence to speak her mind.
Despite the five years’ difference in their ages, Maddie found herself
drawn to the youngster. They called themselves Tweedledum and
Tweedledee, though it was obvious that they were by no means the identical
twins Lewis Carroll envisaged. Maddie was tall and slim with blonde hair
and Gertie was small, verging on the rotund, with glorious red wavy hair.
Neither envied the other, and perhaps that was the glue that cemented
their friendship, although Gertie had immediately scored her new friend
Maddie ‘100 on the cor-blimey scale’. A compliment, it seemed. And
blokes would be falling over themselves to get to her. But she didn’t want
chaps to do that. One man had already made sure that no one else could
ever fill his shoes.
‘Skivvies, that’s all we are – bleedin’ skivvies,’ grumbled Gertie.
‘You’re in the army now, girl. Minute you picked up your military ID
card and army paybook, you were doomed.’ Maddie grinned. ‘The army
had you in its clutches.’ Not that she minded being in its clutches and she
didn’t feel at all doomed. Maddie loved the ATS, the comradeship and even
the discipline had its place, made you feel part of something big and
important.
‘Maybe I ain’t that excited about scrubbin’ floors and making some
snobby officer’s bleedin’ bed,’ said Gertie, a sour look on her face.
‘You want to get paid, don’t you, Gert?’
‘Sure, but not to be a bleedin’ skivvy. This ain’t what I signed up for.’
They had only been at their new posting for a couple of days, but it was
obvious that Gertie was right. Neither of them had been picked for further
specialised training. There were all kinds of jobs that ATS women were
trained for: telephonists, teleprinter operators, drivers, mechanics,
motorcycle messengers and working on Ack Ack batteries. And what had
they got? They’d been posted to Inglis Barracks at Mill Hill, working as
mess orderlies (glorified chambermaids) and waitresses in the officers’
mess. Cleaning the bedrooms and the lounges, sorting out the laundry,
serving meals. Polishing the regimental silver.
Maddie didn’t mind the work, was pleased to still be in the army. And
she remembered what her commanding officer had said: a step down. She
might think it a step down. But she didn’t. She was proud of her ATS
uniform, thrilled to still be wearing it.
But Gertie had been hoping for something else. Something more
exciting. Driving an ambulance, maybe, or a motorcycle. Or a mechanic.
Learning about engines. Learning to do the things that men took for
granted. She was a practical young woman, could have done all kinds of
work, and she had an adventurous spirit.
‘It’s because we wear skirts,’ said Gertie, coming back to her theme of
the day.
‘What is?’
‘Women’s work! Housemaid, parlourmaid, kitchen-bleedin-maid,
bleedin’ bottle washer, cook…’
‘I can’t cook,’ said Maddie, and laughed.
‘And you can stop that right off. This ain’t nothin’ to laugh at,’ said
Gertie.
‘C’mon, Gert. They seem like nice, decent blokes. That captain even
offered to walk us back to our new billet.’
‘Course ’e did!’ Gertie jutted out her lower lip even further, like a kid in
a huff. ‘Well, I for one ain’t no officer’s-bleedin-blanket. They can forget all
that.’
‘Think he got the idea, don’t you?’ Maddie smiled and poked her friend
in the ribs. ‘And some of them did their best to make us welcome.’
‘Bleedin’ snobs, that’s what they are. Them and their regimental
service-dress for dinner and their regimental silver what’s got to be cleaned
every week. Right particular, ain’t they?’
‘Tradition. Something to be said for tradition and I don’t mind serving
them,’ said Maddie, ‘or cleaning their silver. Somebody’s—’
‘—got to do it,’ finished Gertie. Then she laughed too. ‘There’re worse
things, I guess, like cleaning out toilets. Like some of them in basic training
had to.’
‘Sure,’ said Maddie. ‘Marching with mops and buckets to the latrines.
Keeping in step at one hundred and twenty beats a minute…’
‘With a damn mop slung over your bleedin’ shoulder like a rifle.
Bleedin’ marching!’ said Gertie.
‘Well, you know what the army says about marching, Gert: “It’s the
most expeditious and orderly manner in which to move from place to
place.”’ Maddie’s impression of their pompous drill sergeant was spot on,
and both women laughed.
‘You idiot!’ said Gertie.
‘See?’ said Maddie. ‘Life’s not that bad. We got a half-decent billet to
go back to and a weekend pass coming up soon.’
It was true. All of that was true if you saw the glass as half full, if you
were an optimist. If you forgot the sadness of the war and how some good
friends had been lost to it. There were many pluses for both of them.
They’d been billeted in Mill Hill with three other ATS girls in a
rambling old Victorian house in Sunnyfield, where open fields reached out
to the north. Fields smothered with bluebells in the summer. It sounded
idyllic. Except now it wasn’t summer, and the ancient house was cold.
Still, the billet was convenient for their new posting. It only took fifteen
minutes to walk to work in the mess at Inglis Barracks. And, right then, the
whole mess looked very jolly, all decked out in paper chains and a
Christmas tree in one corner of the fancy dining room.
Christmas Day tomorrow – and they were both to report for duty to the
mess officer, who would give them their orders. It sounded like a long day
ahead, but then, as Maddie had pointed out, at least someone else would be
doing the washing-up. So what if they missed their own Christmas
celebration? There was always the New Year to look forward to.
The barracks was home to the Middlesex Regiment, a group of soldiers
nicknamed the ‘Die Hards’. Gertie had sniggered, claiming the nickname
had obvious sexual undertones, but it turned out that this venerable old
regiment had paid dearly for the name. In the blood of soldiers from many
wars when they wore their famous red coats with pride. The coats were
long gone now, but the pride remained. Pride – it was something Maddie
could understand. A sense of belonging was good. And to have something
to believe in.
