We'll Meet Again

So that’s my big news. Our house is all boarded up now until we can get hold of some glass, so it’s pretty gloomy inside, but at least the electricity’s back on again. Otherwise, it’s same as usual—school, homework, football practice, cycle club, pictures. How about you? Have you seen the new Cary Grant film yet? It’s going to be on in Mansfield next week so a gang of us are going over to see it. Has your dad been all right? I think of you a lot like you were after he did that. It makes me mad just to think about it. What does the sea look like now? Not all bright like it was in summer. Whenever I think of Wittlesham it’s always sunny. It’s quite strange when you say it’s been cold and raining for a fortnight.

Sunday. Bad news, I’m afraid. Mam says the bomb has really shaken her up and she doesn’t want to go far from home, so we’ll not be going on holiday this summer. I’m really sick about it, I can tell you. I tried reasoning with her and saying that if she booked up Silver Sands she’d have something to look forward to but she wasn’t having any. Honestly, parents! I’ll be glad when I’m old enough to join up. I’m sick of being treated like a little kid.

Monday. I’ve thought of a way round the holiday problem. The cycle club are doing a tour round the Peaks at the end of July. I’ve already cleared it with the parents to go on that, so what I’ll do is, I’ll come down to see you instead. I can put my bike on the train and there’s a youth hostel in Wittlesham. So I will get down after all! Don’t you think that’s a clever plan?

I’m going to put this in the post now.

Yours truly,

Your friend,

Tom.

X

Annie’s hands were shaking. The bomb story wasn’t really frightening because Tom was obviously all right, and the bit about the old lady getting tiddly even made her smile. But the Featherstones not coming to Wittlesham! It was a nightmare. It was the end of the world. The thought of Tom being in that tent in the garden of Silver Sands this summer had glimmered ahead of her ever since he’d gone away. His alternative plan sounded feasible, but—there were so many buts. Supposing his parents found out and forbade it? Supposing he didn’t have enough money? Supposing the cycle club trip was called off and he lost his cover story? It was a bleak prospect—a summer with no Tom to look forward to.

But then, that X at the bottom of his letter.

She stared at it in the wavering light of the candle flame.

He had never put an X on a letter before.

That had to be a good sign. It was a good sign. Annie blew out the candle and fell asleep with the letter against her hand under the pillow.

Spring turned reluctantly into summer and Britons learned of the loss of the Hood and the abandonment of Crete while the air raids carried on unabated. The one rousing piece of news was the sinking of the battleship Bismark. And then the Nazis invaded Russia. Though the ordinary people of Britain did not realise it at the time, the invasion pressure was off. What concerned them more was that first clothes and then coal were rationed.

At Marsh Edge Farm, Walter Cross finally gave in to pressure from fellow farmers to try sowing ley grass and cutting silage to increase the amount and quality of feed available to the greatly increased dairy herd. By June, a second-hand tractor replaced the elderly work-horse. Its variable reliability did not improve his temper, though even he had to admit that it could work faster and harder than the horse and did not need attending to each day. Annie’s letters contained accounts of these innovations and of her trips into town to meet Gwen and her occasional brushes with Beryl Sutton, but mentioned nothing of Walter’s eruptions of temper. After all, Tom could do nothing about it, and the thought of her being hurt obviously worried him. On top of that, she felt ashamed to admit, even to Tom, what went on in her family. Her letters always ended the same way, asking him if he was still coming to Wittlesham at the end of July. His answer was always the same—yes. But still she harboured doubts.

Her birthday came round. Her mother gave her a blouse she had made out of rayon hoarded from before rationing. It had square shoulders with little shoulder pads and was darted in to a narrow waist. A real grown-up garment. Gwen gave her a lipstick. Fifteen. She was now fifteen years old.

‘We could get married next year,’ said Gwen, whose birthday was a few weeks earlier than hers.

They both tried the lipstick, which was dark red. They tried to do each other’s hair up in fashionable rolls around the face, though Annie’s hair wasn’t really long enough and Gwen’s was too fly-away. Neither of them looked very much like a film star or a dance band singer, but still they were quite pleased with the result.

‘We do look a lot more grown up. That blouse is lovely, very fashionable. You are lucky, Annie, having a mum who can make you things like that,’ Gwen said.

‘Yes, I am,’ Annie agreed, stroking the silky fabric.

‘And you’ve got a boyfriend, you lucky thing.’

Two things to feel lucky about. Annie savoured the feeling. Usually, it was Gwen who had so much more than she did in the way of people in her life.

‘He’s not really a boyfriend. More like a pen-pal,’ Annie said.

‘Ooh!’ Gwen teased. ‘I’ve seen how desperate you are for a letter from him. And you never show them to me. I bet they’re full of lovey-dovey stuff and kisses.’

‘No, they’re not. We just write about what we’ve been doing.’

‘So you say. I wish I had a boyfriend. My mum and dad would go potty, but I’d really like to have one. I want to know what it’s like, being in love.’

‘Mmm,’ Annie said.

She stared at her reflection in the mirror of Gwen’s dressing table. She did look older, what with the lipstick and the hairstyle and the new blouse. No longer a little girl. Love. She imagined love being something all floaty and dreamy, like a romantic song in a film. What she felt for Tom was not like that. It was sometimes quite gnawing and painful and desperate. If he didn’t manage to get to Wittlesham …

‘Wakey wakey!’

Gwen was making faces at her in the mirror. Annie put her tongue out. Gwen crossed her eyes. Annie put her thumbs in her ears and waggled her hands. They collapsed against each other, giggling.

‘Some of the girls at work like John Sutton,’ Gwen said when they had recovered.

‘Ugh! Beryl’s brother!’ Annie squealed.

‘I know but—wouldn’t she be mad if he was my boyfriend. Supposing I married him! She’d have to be my bridesmaid—just think! And that boot-faced mother of theirs, she’d have to smile and be happy. It’d be wonderful!’

‘Why not marry Jeffrey?’ Annie teased.

‘What, that little squirt? No, thank you!’

They both screwed up their faces and collapsed into giggles again.

‘You will let me meet this Tom of yours, won’t you?’ Gwen said.

‘If he comes,’ Annie said.

‘But you will, won’t you?’

‘I expect so,’ Annie prevaricated.

She wasn’t sure. If he did come, she wanted him all to herself.

‘You’d better,’ Gwen told her.

Annie changed the subject.

The nearer it got to the last week in July, the more she wanted to see him, and the less likely it seemed that he would actually arrive. And then, if he did make it, it wasn’t going to be plain sailing. What was he going to do during the day, for a start? It was different when he was here with his family. Even if he did think the little ones were brats and the grown-ups were boring, still they were company. She could only get away in the evenings, and sometimes not even then. It was all so difficult. She turned it over in her mind all day. She lay awake at night worrying. She began to feel quite ill.

On the Friday, she was taking the cows back to their pasture in the evening when she saw a girl on a bike where the track met the Wittlesham road. As she looked, she girl waved frantically and Annie realised that it was Gwen. She waved back. Gwen made beckoning gestures. Annie shut the cows in their field and ran down the track.

‘Gwen! What are you doing here? Whose bike is that?’

‘I borrowed it off my friend at work. Look—I had to bring you this. It says “Urgent”.’

Gwen flashed a letter in front of Annie’s eyes just long enough for her to recognise Tom’s writing, then whipped it behind her back.

‘D’you want it, then?’ she teased, dodging as Annie tried to snatch it from her.

‘Yes—you know I do. Give it—please—!’ Annie squealed.

Gwen was bigger than her and had longer arms. However hard she tried, her friend kept the letter just beyond her reach.

‘Just give it, Gwen. It’s mine!’ she demanded.

She aimed a kick at Gwen’s shins, but she leapt out of the way.

‘Ooh! Kick donkey!’

Annie was practically crying with frustration.

Gwen held the letter with the ends of her fingers, a tan-talising two inches too high for Annie to reach.

‘Promise you’ll let me meet him,’ she bargained.

‘Gwe-en—’

‘Promise!’

‘All right, then.’

Anything, just as long as she could get her hands on that letter.

‘You promised, remember,’ Gwen insisted, and handed it to her.

Annie ripped it open. There was just one sheet of paper inside.

Dear Annie,

Just a note to say that I’ll be on the seven-twenty train on Saturday. Hope you can meet me at the station. It’s going to be a terrific holiday.

Your friend,

Tom.

X

‘Ooh,’ Gwen said, breathing down her neck. ‘Kisses! Who’s a lucky girl, then?’

Annie didn’t even care about the teasing. She flung her arms round her friend.

‘He’s coming!’ she cried. ‘He really is coming!’

CHAPTER NINE

‘ALL RIGHT, son, it’ll be safe with me. I’ll make sure no German spy gets his hands on it,’ the guard said, patting the saddle of Tom’s bike as it leant against the side of the van.

‘Thank you,’ Tom said, forcing himself to sound properly polite.

Why did grown-ups have to patronise you like that? he wondered. He wouldn’t do it when he was a grown-up. It was only a few months now before he would be able to join up. Then they would have to take him seriously.

He hurried down the platform, looking for a carriage with some space in it, but the train was packed. The one before had been cancelled due to lack of rolling stock, so everyone was crowding on to this one. In the end he had to make do with a space in a corridor. A group of soldiers piled on after him and soon he was wedged between khaki-clad bodies and bulky kitbags. It was all very different from the last time he had made this journey. Then he had been with his family and they had got a compartment to themselves. This time it was not exactly comfortable, but it was a whole lot more exciting. Around him the soldiers were laughing and joking and passing round cigarettes. He was on his own, making his way without anyone telling him what to do. The train started. This was it. The adventure had really begun.

By the time he got to London, Tom and the soldiers were the best of mates. Some of them were only a year or so older than him, and they had plenty to tell him about army life. They shared their cigarettes with him, he passed round the sandwiches his mother had made for the first leg of his cycle trip. Tom stopped worrying about whether his cycle club friends might inadvertently drop him in it. This was real life. He was no longer a kid. He was an individual, making his own decisions. Getting from King’s Cross to Liverpool Street when he didn’t know the way was going to be easy.

The journey took the best part of the day. He was starving hungry by the time he reached Colchester and wolfed down a pie and a cup of tea before finally boarding the Wittlesham train. Here he actually got a whole compartment to himself. At first it felt luxurious. Then he began to get nervous. Up till then he had had plenty of people to talk to. Everyone seemed very eager to talk to complete strangers these days. It was something about wartime. The journey across London had been easy enough, for people were more than willing to help a polite young lad and set him on his way. Now at last he actually had time to think about what he was doing.

Over the seats opposite him were two posters of Wittlesham, one showing the pier, the other the winter gardens. Wittlesham. All year, it had seemed like Shangri-La to him. Now he was actually going there. In between the posters was a small mirror. Tom stood up and studied his reflection. Was that a spot breaking out on his chin? He poked the place with his finger. It felt like it. Damn. He wanted to look—well—nice for Annie.

It set off a chain of anxieties. Would Annie still like him? Was it going to be like last time? She’d been working for a year now, up all hours looking after sick and calving cows, driving heavy machinery and the like, while he’d still been at school. Would he seem like a kid to her? He took out a comb and slicked back his hair. Was this all a big mistake? Maybe he should have gone on the cycle club trip after all, and kept it so that he and Annie were just pen-pals. But … he did want to see her again. He sat down on the stiff horsehair-filled seat and tried to remember exactly what she looked like—the wave of her hair, the expression in her eyes, her smile … and then there was the feel of her soft skin, the way her fingers curled round his … Yes, he did want to see her again. Very much.

He recognised some of the landmarks as the train rumbled into Wittlesham. There was the rock factory. There was the back of the Toledo cinema. As they pulled into the station, he let down the window panel on its leather strap and stuck his head out. Was she there? He was sure she would come and meet him if she could, but maybe she hadn’t been able to get away. Her father. Always there was her father, standing in their way. Tom understood. It wasn’t her fault if she couldn’t be there, but he really did want to see her waiting for him on the platform. It caught him by surprise, how much he wanted it. The lurch of hope clutched at his guts like a huge hand.

The train slowed to a halt with a squeal of brakes and a billow of steam. There were hardly any people on the platform. A mother and child, an old lady, a station official. Disappointment sank through him, sick and sour. Her bloody father. It was all his fault. Tom picked up his canvas knapsack and hoisted it over his shoulder, then jumped down and went to collect his bike from the guard’s van. He wheeled it after the straggle of passengers making for the exit and held out his ticket to the collector at the barrier.

‘Tom!’

He looked up. There, just beyond the barrier, flushed and breathless, was Annie.

‘Annie! You made it!’

Happiness surged up and spread a huge smile over his face. He hurried forward until they were standing within a foot of each other, each of them gazing at the other and smiling and smiling. She looked the same, and yet different. The same Annie, just as pretty, just as pleased to see him, but more grown up. Yes, that was it. More grown up.

Overcome with shyness, they shook hands.

‘I’m so glad you managed to get here,’ Tom said.

It sounded stupid even as it came out. He felt himself going red.

‘I nearly didn’t. I had to cycle like billy-o all the way,’ Annie told him.

Her hair was longer. That was it. And done in a different way, except that the cycle ride had blown it about. It looked nice like that, all wild round her face.

She saw him looking at it. Her hand went to her head, smoothing her hair down.

‘I look a mess.’

‘No, you don’t. You look very nice. Very … pretty.’

He stumbled over the compliment and felt even hotter. Why couldn’t he be suave and sophisticated, like someone in a film? He fiddled with the gear lever on the handlebars of his bike.

‘You look older. And you’re taller, too. I have to look up more than last year,’ Annie commented.

It was true. Sometimes he felt all legs and elbows.

‘It’s nice,’ she added. ‘I can’t really believe you’re here. I thought … I was really hoping you would be able to come, but when you said your family weren’t … and then all this about the cycle club and coming here instead, and I thought you’d never be able to make it but …’

‘Here I am!’ Tom said.

‘Large as life and twice as natural!’ Annie cried.

And then they were laughing, and it was all right. It was just like last year. Tom knew he could say anything and Annie would understand, just as it had been then.

‘I suppose I’d better go to the youth hostel first, and make sure there’s a bed for the night,’ Tom said.

‘Right. It’s up this way,’ Annie told him.

They walked along together, wheeling their bikes, talking away nineteen to the dozen. There was so much to say, all the things that they had written to each other to be expanded and explained. A mother with a pushchair passed them. Tom moved to let her by and his hand touched Annie’s. Her fingers clasped his. He stole a glance at her and saw that her face was pink with pleasure, and knew that his was just the same.

So much to say, and so little time to say it. After he had dropped his things at the youth hostel, Tom rode with Annie to where the farm track met the Wittlesham road.

‘See you tomorrow, then. Where shall we meet?’ Tom asked.

Annie considered. He watched the way she screwed up her face a little when she was thinking.

‘Silver Sands!’ she said. ‘Where else?’

‘Of course. Silver Sands,’ Tom agreed.

He hesitated. He knew what he wanted to do. Then he took a breath and swooped forward, planting a kiss on her cheek.

‘See you tomorrow!’ he said, and jumped on his bike.

All the way back to the youth hostel, he felt as if he could conquer the world.

All the next morning, Annie was bursting with energy, despite the fact that she had slept very little the night before. Whatever her father asked her to do, she breezed through it with ease. His bad temper just slid off her. The only problem was appearing as if everything was just the same as normal when the whole world was glowing with possibilities. She caught herself singing as she washed her hands for dinner, despite the fact that her father was scowling and growling behind her. Her mother shot her a puzzled look.

‘You’re cheerful,’ she whispered, when Walter was in the scullery.

‘Oh, well … it’s a nice sunny day,’ Annie said.

She sucked in her smiles and helped her mother bring the food to the table. During the meal she kept her eyes on her plate and concentrated on eating. But it was hard, when what she wanted to do was to dance round the room.

Through the long afternoon, she wondered what Tom was doing. Was he all right? Was he lonely? It wasn’t as if Wittlesham was much of a resort any more. At least it was nice weather, and he could be outside.

The evening chores had never seemed so lengthy. Annie seethed with impatience as her father checked that she had done everything right. As usual, he took issue with her over details and she had to do things again, but at last she was free.

‘I think I’ll just go for a walk down to the water,’ she said, as offhand as she could manage.

‘Waste of energy,’ Walter growled. ‘What about your ma? She want anything doing?’

‘No, no. I asked her and she said not.’

‘You sure?’

‘Yes. Completely sure.’

‘Go and check.’

Annie swallowed down her howl of frustration. If she let him see how much it meant to her, he would invent something for her to do, or even simply forbid her to go.

‘All right,’ she agreed, and went to see her mother.

At last she was released. At lightning speed, she washed, changed, ran a comb through her hair and smoothed on some of the new lipstick. And then she was off, running across the fields towards Silver Sands as if her life depended upon it.

And there was Tom, waiting for her by the gate.

‘Seems funny to see the old place all shut up,’ he said after they had gone over their news of the day.

They were sitting on the sea wall, but not in their old place, the sea side. This time they were on the landward side, overlooking Silver Sands.

Annie lay back on the long dry grass. It was lovely to rest after the day’s work, to feel the last of the sun on her face, to have a soul mate to talk to.

‘It’s been shut ever since your family left. I was so mad when my dad didn’t buy it from Mr Sutton. I don’t even know who owns it now but, whoever it is, they haven’t done anything to it. I suppose they’re just waiting for the war to end before they can let it again.’

‘Might have a bit of a wait, then,’ Tom said.

‘Yes,’ Annie sighed. ‘Nearly two years now.’

‘At least we weren’t invaded. Remember last year, when the Germans were just over the North Sea?’

‘And the Battle of Britain was going on in the sky?’

‘We won that.’

‘We did. Good old RAF.’

‘I’m going to join the RAF.’

‘You said that last year.’

‘I know. I meant it then, but it seemed a long way away. Now it’s just over four months.’

‘What?’

Fear jolted through Annie. She sat up and stared at Tom. He was still looking at the chalet, a long piece of grass between his teeth.

‘Four months,’ he repeated. ‘Till I’m eighteen.’

Something seemed to be squeezing her chest, making it difficult to breathe.

‘But … but … you’re still at school,’ she said.

‘So?’ Tom threw the grass stalk away and selected another. ‘All the more reason to join up. Do something real. What’s the point of studying if the country might be conquered? I want to get out there and do my bit.’

Annie cast about desperately in her mind for an argument.

‘Well, of course you do,’ she said, ‘but—you don’t have to go yet. I know there’s talk of the call-up coming down to eighteen, but it hasn’t yet. Why not wait? You’re so lucky to be able to stay at school.’

‘For heaven’s sake! You sound just like my dad. I don’t want to stay at school. What I’m doing there is irrelevant. There are people out there defending our country and what am I doing? Studying stuff that has nothing to do with real life. Look at you—you’re doing your bit, you’re doing a man’s work on the farm, putting up milk production and helping feed the country. It just makes me feel useless.’