“Go to sleep and pretend you’re there now!” whispered Fliss, waving the handkerchief again and swaying gently as Edie dozed against her shoulder, slumped on the hard floor of the Tube station. Fliss began to hum the tune to “Oh, Johnny, Oh”, one of the songs which “Snakehips” Johnson, the famous band leader at the cafe, liked to play.
Edie closed her eyes, listening as Fliss sang softly in her ear, and breathing in the rich musky scent of Chanel. As she drifted off to sleep, she imagined she really was in the cafe, amongst all the beautiful dancers, like Cinderella at a royal ball.
Hours later, Edie woke with a start. She reached out, expecting to touch soft furs beneath her, but felt only the cold damp floor of the Underground station. Then she remembered where she was. She wasn’t in the Café de Paris at all. She was down in the Tube, squashed up on the platform like a sardine in a can.
“Come on!” whispered Fliss. “The all clear’s sounded. We can go home.”
It was morning as they stumbled back up the steps and out into the bright spring light and bustle of Piccadilly Circus. Signs of the war were all around: even the famous statue of Eros had been covered up with sandbags to keep the winged god safe from bombs.
Edie blinked and rubbed her eyes. She always hated this moment, coming back above ground. What if their flat had been bombed in the night, and there was nothing left but sky and fallen rubble where her pretty blue bedroom had once been? She forced herself to look towards Glasshouse Street and breathed a sigh of relief. She could see the tip of the turret on their high attic roof, pointing proudly to the sky like a lighthouse.
“All clear!” she murmured. But as soon as she glanced in the opposite direction she saw ambulances and fire engines streaming out of Coventry Street and down Haymarket to their right.
“Somewhere close has been hit,” said a woman as she squeezed past them with a cat in a basket. “I’m just glad my Ginger was safe.”
As they drew closer, Edie could see a barricade half-drawn across the road. People in suits and overalls were hurrying to work and, in amongst the hustle and bustle of the regular morning routine, wardens were shouting and waving their arms.
“Direct hit last night! Hell of a mess,” sighed an ARP warden, as two firemen with blackened faces sat on the edge of the pavement nestling big tin mugs of tea.
“Oh no!” whispered Edie. She bit her lip. Somehow she knew, even before they saw the shattered building, that it was the Café de Paris.
“It can’t be true,” gasped Fliss, steadying herself against Edie’s shoulder.
There was nothing left but the balcony, suspended like an arch in the sky. Three whisky glasses were still resting on a little table, which seemed to hang in mid-air as if waiting for the drinkers to return. In the crater below, the grand piano sat unharmed in the rubble, covered in shards of twinkling glass from the splintered flower-petal lights.
“So much for being bombproof, eh?” shrugged the warden as they stood and stared. There was a horrible, thick, burnt smell of smoke and gas.
“Did everyone get out?” asked Edie desperately. “Did they all get away?”
The warden shook his head solemnly. “Not all, I’m afraid, miss. It took a direct hit. Right through the roof.”
Edie shuddered. Then she saw Lottie, the chorus-line dancer they knew. She was standing on the opposite side of the street, shivering in her tiny dance costume, which was more like a ballet tutu than a real dress. The huge white ostrich feather in her hair was grey with dust. Fliss grabbed a blanket from an ambulance man and dashed across the road to wrap it around Lottie’s shoulders.
“It’s all right, poppet,” she whispered. “It’s all over now.”
Edie followed. She stretched out her hand and rubbed Lottie’s back, just like Fliss did whenever she was sad. Tears streamed down the dancer’s pale, delicate face, clearing channels like little rivers through the dust and soot. “Me and the girls just missed it,” she sobbed. “We were waiting in the wings, about to come on. Another minute or so and we’d have been on stage… But Snakehips was right there. Right underneath it. He was just starting the opening bars of ‘Oh, Johnny, Oh!’” She gulped for breath. “And poor Mr Poulson, the manager, too.”
Edie felt sick. She wanted to turn and run away but she couldn’t move. She stood rooted to the spot as Lottie shook her head and wiped away the tears with the back of her hand.
“God rest their souls,” Lottie whispered, and she staggered away up the street.
“Poor lass,” said the warden. “Anyone who got out was lucky to survive.”
“Buckingham Palace was hit too,” said a fireman who was searching through the rubble. “But the Royal Family are safe.”
“God save the King!” roared a soldier with a bandage over one eye. Edie wasn’t sure if he’d come from the cafe or just been walking down the street, but he was swigging from a dusty bottle of champagne that he must have found in the rubble. He offered Fliss a sip but she shook her head.
“Let’s go
