The Day Room

Dance, dance, dance, little lady,
Dance, dance, dance, little lady!
Leave tomorrow behind.

Noël Coward

I got a letter from Aunt Sybil a few days later.  It wasn't such a bad one, for her:

Dear Sonya,

Firstly, please let me say how sorry I am that we did not part as friends last Saturday.  I do hope that you appreciate that I have only your best interests at heart.  You must understand how disappointed I am that you have given up such a promising future in order to fulfil some foolish romantic dreams.  The trouble is that dreams have a habit of ending; and then there is the morning, and the day and its business to deal with.  I'm am afraid that you will wake up one day and find that the future, to which you may not have given too much thought, has arrived and that you are sadly ill-equipped to face it.

I am sure that if your mother were still alive she would agree with me.

'Pig,' I said.

Still, be that as it may, you have chosen your own way.  It is not a way that I can wholeheartedly endorse, but for dear Cora's sake I cannot bring myself to abandon you completely.

I had further words with Captain Lowther following your precipitate departure and she was able to allay many of my fears concerning the Ambulance Brigade.  She has assured me that many girls of very good family are engaged in service with the Brigade.  She pointed out that your friend Miss Patterson has excellent County connections, and I have been able to verify her assertion by visiting the Pattersons in Goring and speaking to Mabel's mother.  So far, I am tolerably satisfied.

I have, of course, written to your father and informed him of your actions.  I should not be surprised if he were to use his influence to have you extricated from your present position.  In the meantime, please remember that the blood of the Greshams flows in your veins and comport yourself accordingly.  In particular, do not fall into the habit of using coarse language.  Nobody worth knowing will think any better of you for it, and you run the risk of causing grave offence to people on whom you may one day need to rely.

Captain Lowther has informed me that you receive an honorarium of five shillings a week, plus bed and board.  It is, of course, quite impossible  for a girl of your upbringing to subsist on such a low level of remuneration and so I have made arrangements for a suitable allowance to be paid into the Holborn branch of Coutts on a monthly basis.

'Hooray!'

Please use this allowance wisely.  It is intended to provide for your clothing and any supplementary comestible items that you may require. I understand that Fortnum and Mason or Paxton and Whitfield may still be depended upon, even in these present straitened times.

One last word before I close.  I do hope that you will resist the temptations which your new way of life will place before you.  I have already mentioned the use of vulgar speech.  There will be other traps and snares lying in wait for you - alcoholic liquor, fast living and casual promiscuity, to mention only a few.  I only ask you to remember who you are and to be true to yourself.

With love,

Aunt Sybil

'Well, beggar you!' I said, and Alfie laughed.  Laughed like a drain, he did.

I called us the Comrades Three, after a series of books I'd read when I was a little girl.  There were lots of them, all published in colourful covers at a shilling each.  Let's see - there were Three in the Black Hills, Three to the Antipodes, Three in Trouble, Three and the Green Diamond of Andalusia, Three and the Mystery of Castle Douglas and my favourite, Three in Battle.  There were lots more of them, but I've forgotten their names now.  I wrote my own Comrades Three story when I was twelve, by the way - I called it Three for One, Three for All.

Anyway; Nancy White, Mabel Patterson and I were the new Three.  We hadn't been to Turquemenistan or Tasmania, and we hadn't led a charge against the Tartar cavalry or sailed the Peaceable Ocean, but I reckoned we were adventurers all the same. 

'It's a kind of adventure,' said Nancy.  We were sitting in the restaurant on the top floor of Harvey's department store, next to the window.  Pigeons were swooping and flapping around the bushes in the roof garden outside.  If it had been summer we'd have sat at a table out there but it wasn't; it was winter, with chilly field-grey skies and a threat of snow to come.

'If adventuring means being tired, uncomfortable and hungry all the time,' said Mabel.  Her Hal dipped his beak into my vanilla milk-shake.

'It's not so bad at the moment,' I said.  'In fact - I don't know.  It's almost becoming boring.'

The others glared at me.  'You just wait, said Nancy.  'When you've been in the Service as long as us, you'll be glad of a quiet patch.'

According to the reports in the Chronicle, the War was (quite possibly) drawing to a close.  In other words, not a lot was happening.  Reading between the lines, it looked as if both sides had dug in for the winter.  Our side was somewhere west of Geneva, the Pagan Horde was somewhere to the east.  Our witch-daemons reported that the beleaguered townsfolk of the Holy City were stiffening their sinews and tightening their belts ready for a siege.  No doubt the blatts on the other side were reporting the opposite.

I gave Nancy a mock bow.  'Sorry, Ma'am.'

'Oh, get away with you!'

We'd been on a shopping expedition.  Not a little trip to get a few bits and pieces like Mabel and I had made a couple of weeks before when I'd told her our secret.  No - I'd been down to the bank and drawn all my first month's allowance in one go.  Fifty pounds!  I could almost bring myself to like Aunt Sybil if she carried on like this.  Now I could really push the boat out.

I'd bought a whole load of new clothes, some decent lipstick and, as a special treat, I'd taken us down past Piccadilly Circus to Jermyn Street and visited Floris' perfumery.  What a lovely place…  Real scent!  Real soap!  Real shampoo! Real face cream!  Real talcum powder!  I'd almost forgotten what they felt like, what they smelt like, how pretty the bottles and jars were.  I was in heaven and in the end the others had to drag me forcibly from the shop or we'd have been there all day.  Then I got some shortbread biscuits from Fortnum's and a filthy great chocolatl cake with sugar icing smothered all over it.  I'd share it out when we got back to the depot.

And now we were partaking of a delicious light lunch in the elegant surroundings of the Bamboo Room in Harvey's.  It was such a relief to be somewhere nice for a change. There was nothing wrong with the food at the depot - despite Mabel's complaints - but it became just a little repetitive after a while.  It was healthy, it was probably well-balanced and nutritious, it kept body and daemon together, but it was dull.  Stodgy, boring and dull, like school food.

'All right,' I said, pretending to get up.  'I'm off.  I'll go and work as a nurse at the Countess of Marston's Hospital for Officers.  I bet they know how to treat a girl properly there.'  I'd seen a notice on the restaurant wall, next to the sign that said:

SHUSH YOUR DAEMON
DON'T SPILL SECRETS

The notice was pleased to inform diners in the Bamboo Room that, for every glass of Romain's Brytish Wine that was ordered, threepence would be donated to Lady Margaret, Countess of Marston's Hospital.

'I've heard about that place,' said Mabel.  'They say that the officers wear blue silk pyjamas and drink champagne for breakfast and all the nurses have to do is sit on the ends of the beds, chat to the patients and smoke gaspers.  They have some wonderful parties, I hear.'

'So what are we waiting for?  Let's join them.'  I took a swig of Romain's Brytish Wine.  It was pretty foul stuff, to tell the truth.

'Titles, you goose.  You can't be a nurse at Lady Margaret's unless you've got a title.'

'Oh.'  The only way I was going to get a title was to marry one. 

'We're not doing that, are we?' said Alfie.  No, I thought.  We weren't going to marry anybody.  Not while we were still special.

'All right then,' I said.  There was a pause while the waitress brought us bowls of lemon mousse and vanilla ice cream with cinnamon wafers.  'We'll have a party of our own.'

'A party?'

'How?'

'Where?'

'Never mind How and Where,' I said.  'The important question is, When?'

I called a Supplementary Conclave of the Three that evening, back at the depot.  We sat in a row on my bed, daemons on our laps, and feasted on the remains of the Fortnum's cake.

'Now, Compadres.  I say we throw the party right here.'

'Here?'

'In the depot?'

'Yes, here.  We can use the day room.  There's a wireless there already, so we've got music laid on.  Fred Dennison and his Romanticos are on the BBC every Saturday night, so that's when we'll do it.  Next Saturday.'

'Fred Dennison…'  Nancy had a photogram of the good-looking Mister Dennison pasted on the dorm wall next to her bed.  We'd all seen her stroking her Abel while looking at Fred's handsome moustachioed face, hadn't we?

'We can put the sofas out in the garage and set a bar up by the door.'

'And hang streamers outside the windows and put balloons up in the corners.'

'We'll need more posters.'

'It'll cost money…'

I held up my hand.  'Don't care about money.  Got money. Want fun!'

'We can get some brandtwijn and jenniver…'

'Rhein and Moselle...'

'Lemonade and bitters...'

'Fruit punch…'

'Crisps…'

'Tomato and aubergine dip…'

'Prawn toasts…'

'Cocktail sausages…'

'Cocktails!'

'Baked potatoes and cheese…'

'Oh, Mabel!  How could you!' said Nancy and me together.

'It'll be wonderful!'

'It'll be magical!'

'We'll invite all the officers from the Hospital!'

'They'll be gorgeous, every one of them…'

'And rich…'

'Ahhh!!!' the Three chorused.  But…

'What…' said Mabel and Hal.

'About…' said Nancy and Abel.

'The boss?' said Mabel and Hal.

'Leave her to us,' said Alfie and me, and we declared the Conclave closed.

We decided not to move all the sofas out after all.  You never knew, as Nancy said, when the Romantico mood might come over you, or one of the bachelor guests.

'Especially if he's eligible beyond belief!' added Mabel.

I had a tougher time than I'd expected with the Captain.  It seemed obvious to me that it was much better for us to hold a party at the depot where the boss could keep an eye on us than for me and my friends to go up west to the Locarno or the Palais Ballroom in Leicester Square, get sloshed, pass out, spend the night in the cells and be brought back between the arms of two burly constables.  I couldn't actually say that of course, because I didn't want her to stop us going to the big swanky dancehalls at some time in the future.  So instead I put on an earnest face and talked about corps morale, and brightening up the long dark winter nights and safe, wholesome, supervised enjoyment.

'We don't get very much exercise, you know, Ma'am,' I said. 'Dancing is most tremendously good for you.'

'Hmmm.  I can easily organize some cross-country runs on the Heath, if that's what you'd like.'

'Yes, Ma'am,' I said, panicking a little inside. Compulsory runs in the freezing cold were one of the things I'd hoped I'd left behind at Highdean School. 'That's such a good idea.  I wish I'd thought of it.'

'Moon!'

'Ma'am?'

'When I need your approval, I will ask you for it.  I must say that I am not at all keen on this idea of yours.'

'Yes, Ma'am.  Sorry, Ma'am.'  Oh, beggar it.  Me and my big mouth.  'But, Ma'am?'

'Yes, Moon?'  The Captain had taken up her pen and was about to dismiss me. We were sunk unless I could think of something quickly.

'Please?  None of us have been able to wear our nice frocks for ever so long.'  I was following a hunch.  'Trousers are fine, for everyday wear.  But - they do chafe so.'

'You could not perform your daily tasks in skirts, could you?'

'No, Ma'am, no.  But we'd love to put on some pretty things for a change.  Don't you think we'd look smashing in them?'

The boss put her pen down again. She looked up and smiled slightly.  'Ruffles, Fortuny pleats and feather boas?  Silk stockings? That sort of thing?'  I had never seen her out of her green serge uniform.

'Yes, Ma'am.  And shoes with Louis heels and long grey evening gloves.  Can't you just imagine how nice we'd look?'

'Hmmm.' The Captain was, I could tell, imagining it.  I held my breath. Would my little idea work?

'Very well, Moon.  May I leave the organisation of this event in your capable hands?'

'It's already in train, Ma'am.'

The Captain sighed and picked up her pen.  'Why am I not surprised to hear you say that?  Go on; get on with it.'  And Deuteronomy gave me a sideways wink.

'Send three and fourpence!'

'We're going to a dance!'

The old jokes are the best, aren't they?  It didn't matter how old they were that Saturday afternoon, we were so excited.  I was standing on the stairway outside the day room supervising the preparations for the evening.  We'd rolled back the carpet and stored it in the drugs cupboard.  The floor underneath was in better condition that I had dared to hope. One of the new girls had got a can of wax polish from the stores and was applying it to the boards while the others walked up and down with lengths of flannelette bound over their boots, polishing the surface.  With any luck we'd have a decent dance floor in no time at all.

I delivered the invitations to the Countess of Marston's Hospital myself.  It was an odd feeling to be sent down into the area basement for a cup of tea with the servants while my note was taken up to Lady Margaret.  Afterwards, of course, they realised their mistake and invited me upstairs with many apologies and we got on very well.  Even so, I got my first inkling of what Aunt Sybil had meant about my new way of life.  There were some things I would no longer be able to take for granted, like entering people's houses by the front door.

We'd agreed that those officers who could not make their own way to Mornington would be transported by ambulance, so I set two of the new bugs to tying red-white-and-blue ribbons to the least decrepit vehicle we had.  I had them scrub away the blood-stains, too.

Once the floor was looking half-decent we set to work on the walls.  Tinsel, paper streamers, kinema posters, official portraits of the Royal Family, anything would do - anything at all to hide the awful state of the paintwork underneath.  I got hold of some coloured sello and fixed it over the lamps to add an air of mystery and glamour to the place.  Meanwhile, Mabel was busy in the kitchens getting the food together and Nancy was polishing the glasses we'd hired for the occasion.

Daddy always says that an effective leader knows when to delegate his authority, so I told the least dim of the new girls to carry on and went up into the dorm to look at the parcel Aunt Sybil had sent from home.  It had arrived that morning, just in time.

I tore off the wrappings, saving the string and paper of course, and inspected the contents.  Yes. Yes!  She'd packed the red silk evening dress - my favourite.  She'd also packed its yellow sash, but that could stay in the wardrobe.  It looked like a banana.  There was my nicest underwear too, and the gloves, shoes, handbag and jewellery I'd asked for.  Good old Aunt Syb!  The note she'd slipped into the tissue paper told me to have a lovely time and not to do anything I might regret later.

'Sybil, dearest,' I said.  'I'm going to do lots of regrettable things!'

'You bet!' said Alfie.

I laid the clothes out on my bed.  I'd change into them later.  You see, I had a plan.

The Countess had told me that fifteen of the men in her care were well enough to come to our dance, but would need transport.  That meant two runs in the ambulance, as there were eight casualty seats in it.  At quarter-past seven, still wearing my driver's uniform, I arrived outside the hospital.  The men were waiting in the hall - some of them standing by the door and looking very well in their freshly pressed tunics and polished Sam Browns.  The others were sitting by the walls, gripping the heads of their canes or staring straight ahead at the opposite wall or down towards the black and white marble tiled floor, with their equally dejected daemons by their feet.  I did my best to hide my sorrow - why should they have to suffer so? - and put on my brightest smile.  'Come on, chaps,' I said.  'First come, first served!  I've got eight places.'

Four of the more able-bodied men each took the arm of one of his brother officers and helped him to his feet, down the steps and into the back of the ambulance.  I followed, choking on my tears.

'That's what Gerry would have done,' said Alfie.

'Yes.  Of course he would.  Yes,' I sobbed, wiping my eyes on my sleeve.

I ferried the first group from Belgravia to Mornington in ten minutes flat.    My driving had become pretty good by now, although tending to follow Mabel's example when it came to speed.  I pulled into the yard and stopped as gently as I could manage.  Looking up, I saw that someone had fixed a string of coloured light bulbs over the stairs to the day room (in defiance of the black-out) and arranged streamers around the door.  Over it a cardboard sign said Grands Frolics de Mornington.  I sighed.  It was just like the parties at home in the old days.  Well, almost.  The wireless was turned up to full volume.  You could hear it booming over the rooftops.  There'd be some complaints in the morning!

I blew the hooter and, in a rustle of satin and a patter of heels, my driver comrades, transformed into elegant, well-groomed young ladies for a few hours, came down the stairs into the yard and helped their guests out of the back of the ambulance.  I tooted my horn again.  'Back soon!' I shouted, and hared out of the yard as fast as I could go.

It took less than ten minutes this time.  In a splatter of flying gravel I skidded to a halt outside the hospital. I leapt out of the door and ran up the steps.  There were, by my count, seven more passengers for me to take to Mornington.  I banged on the door, and it opened wide, revealing the people inside.  All of them.  I stood stock-still, feeling my jaw drop.

Oh.  Bloody. Hell.  Bloody. Beggaring. Hell.  There were my seven officers.  And there, standing or sitting next to them, were ten nurses, dressed up to the nines, wearing dinky little diamond tiaras on their heads and clutching their poncy daemons in their arms.  That was the last thing we needed.  Competition.  And titled competition, at that.  I had to think fast.  Again.

'Lady Sonya!'  It was the Countess, standing at the bottom of the staircase with her ermine-daemon in her arms.  'How wonderful to see you.' Yes, I hadn't been entirely truthful with her.

I bobbed a curtsey.  'Lady Margaret. I've come for the rest of your young men.'

'And my young ladies too, I hope.  We can't have you ambulance drivers hogging all our chaps, can we?'  I saw one of the titled darlings nod vigorously and whisper to the creature standing next to her.

I glued my most innocent smile to the front of my face.  'No, of course not, Lady Margaret.  The, er, Ladies' Carriages will be here directly.  They were close behind me when I crossed Oxford Street.'

'Oh, marvellous,' said Lady Margaret.  'You do think of everything, don't you?  Now, I shall expect to see you back here again no later than eleven-thirty.'

'Yes, Lady Margaret.'

'And Sonya…' the Countess beckoned my over to her side and spoke quietly.  'Most of them… seem all right, but… do you know what I mean?'

'Yes, Lady Margaret.'  She looked at me more closely that she had before.

'Good.  Yes, I see that you do.  If there is any difficulty… if you need to telephone… for assistance, you know… or ask one of my girls to help, please don't hesitate.  The men are in your charge now.'

I looked into her eyes.  They were misty with concern.  'Yes, Lady Margaret.'

The Countess kissed my cheek. 'Go on, then,' she said.  'Enjoy yourselves!'

I delivered my remaining passengers to the waiting drivers.  From upstairs the sound of the wireless mingled with conversation and the sound of feet on bare floorboards.  'You are joining us, aren't you?' said Nancy, looking very pretty in yellow taffeta, bother her.

'Oh yes.  I just need to change.  With you in just a tick.'  It was seven forty-five.  I had fifteen minutes.

In the empty dorm I quickly washed those bits of me that I'd missed before which or needed re-doing.  There had been such a rush for the bathrooms earlier!  Then I got out of my functional, practical, but hideously unflattering driver's clothes and the cheap and now rather grey cotton underwear that went with them.

Aunt Sybil, bless her, had included a rigidly whale-boned corset with my things.  I laughed.  I was going to dance, not sit bolt upright all evening! I put it to one side. I got into my underthings, rolled up my stockings - beautiful black silk stockings from Harvey's -  and attached them to my garter-belt. Then a nice frilly petticoat, also black. Now for the frock…  I lifted it up by the hem and dived head-first into it, feeling it slither down my front and settle on my hips and shoulders.  I jumped up and down a couple of times to make sure it was all in place and then…  And then…

And then I realised that my plan had gone all to pieces.  There were eighteen buttons, hooks and eyes attached to the back of the dress and nobody to do them up for me.  No lady's maid, no Mabel, no Nancy, no Mummy, no nobody. There'd be no grand entrance for me. No entrance at all.

I sat down on the bed and cried.  How could I have been so stupid?  Was I going to have to stay here all night?  Wouldn't somebody miss me and come up to the dorm and rescue me?  Yes, they probably would, but by then it would be too late.

'Oh beggar it, beggar it, beggar it!' I cried out in my vexation.  I tried reaching over my shoulders, but I couldn't find even one button, let alone its button-hole.

That was that, then.  There I sat, with my beautiful red silk dress flapping around my shoulders and my head in my hands, crying like a little girl.  I'd miss the whole thing.  Just because I'd tried to be so bloody clever.  What an idiot!  Everyone else would be enjoying themselves at the party, but not me.  Not stupid, clever-clogs me.

'I'll go home tomorrow,' I told Alfie.  'Aunt Sybil's right.  I'm not fit to be allowed out, a silly little kid like me.'

Alfie nuzzled me.  'Sunny?' he said.

'Yes, I'm Sunny. What do you want?'

'There is a way...'

'There is?  What way?'

'Our way.  If we do something special…'

It was the stroke of eight o'clock.  I stood outside the half-closed door of the day room, my evening bag in my hand, Alfie on my shoulder and my heart thumping faster than I had ever known it do before.  The music had stopped for a few moments while the BBC's announcer read the news.  Everyone inside was facing the set, as if they were watching the speaker, and so they never saw me.

The news was the usual stuff.  Truth and half-lies.  Look; don't misunderstand me.  I knew that we were in the right.  I knew that we had to stand up for what we believed and that the Church had to be defended from the forces of chaos.  I was not going to stand by and do nothing about the threat to our spiritual heritage; nor was I going to let Gerry's loss be all in vain.

It was just that I wasn't stupid, either.  I knew that there were two kinds of truth - official truth and the real thing.  Official truth was like my official age.  I was nineteen.  Yes?  You would like to argue with that, Miss Gresham?  The real truth was that I was only sixteen and a half.  But which truth mattered?  It didn't matter; that was the answer.  What mattered was that I was doing my bit for my people, for my home and for my God.

So even though I knew that the War probably wouldn't be over by the Spring, even though I knew that the official truth was probably untrue, I knew where my duty lay.  It was here; here in Mornington, doing what I could to help the poor bastards who had been maimed and crippled by the Enemy.

There.  Was that coarse enough for you, Auntie?

The bulletin ended, and the announcer's tone of voice changed between one breath and the next; from solemnity to gaiety:

'And now, by live relay direct from the Orchid Room of the Leonardo Hotel in the heart of London's West End, the BBC is proud to present Glamorous Nights, starring your favourite entertainers!'

Music swelled in the background - saxophones, clarinets and strings.  A drum-roll followed, and the announcer read out the list of tonight's performers.  A ventriloquist and a trapeze act (on the wireless?), a balalaika quintet, a classical pianist (yawn) and…

'Your own, your very own, Fred Dennison and his Romanticos!'

There was a burst of applause.  That was my cue.  I flung the door wide open and made my entrance.  Everyone in the room turned to look at me as from the wireless came the sound of debonair Fred, standing in front of the microphone and crooning:

Those who dance and romance while they dance,
They seem so happy and gay,
Tho' they sing while they swing and they sway,
Somehow I can't feel that way,

For I'm dancing with tears in my eyes,
'Cause the girl in my arms isn't you,
Dancing with somebody new,
When it's you that my heart's calling to,

Trying to smile once in a while,
But I find it so hard to do,
For I'm dancing with tears in my eyes,
'Cause the girl in my arms isn't you.

One of the officers came forward and bowed before me.  He took me by the arm and led me to the middle of the dance floor.  It was my moment.  My time had come, and I was going to make the most of it. This was my night!

Dancing With Tears In My Eyes by Al Dubin and Joe Burke is quoted without permission.