As Fliss pulled her away, Edie spotted a high-heeled silver shoe lying in the gutter. Just one, as if it had been dropped by Cinderella at the ball … except that it was covered in dust and soot.
She shivered.
“That’s it! I’m getting you out of this city,” said Fliss, almost dragging Edie back past the boarded-up statue of Eros.
“You mean we’re leaving?” said Edie. “When?” But Fliss didn’t even seem to hear her.
“I should have done it months ago,” she said, talking more to herself than to Edie. “What kind of mother am I?”
“Where will we go?” said Edie, tugging at her sleeve. “London’s our home.”
“Not any more,” said Fliss. She put her arm round Edie’s shoulder but her voice was still shaking as she spoke. “Seeing the cafe like that has brought me to my senses. Suppose we’d been there again last night. You could have been killed … and now school’s closing too.” She stopped in the middle of the street. “I’ve made up my mind,” she said. “You’ll have to go to Aunt Roberta in the country.”
“Aunt Roberta? In Yorkshire?” Edie gasped. “What about you?” she asked, panic rising in her throat. “Will you come too?” She had never been anywhere without Fliss before.
“No.” Fliss shook her head. “I’m afraid not, poppet.”
“But I’ve never met Aunt Roberta,” said Edie. “You told me you fell out with her when I was still a baby.”
“Oh, don’t worry about any of that!” Fliss brushed away her protests and began hurrying down the street again. “You’re family and there’s a war on. None of that nonsense matters now.”
Edie ran to catch up. “Then why did you and Aunt Roberta stop speaking to each other in the first place?” she blurted out.
“Oh, it was nothing, really. I suppose she disapproved of the way I lived my life,” said Fliss vaguely. She waved her hands in the air as if dismissing any further questions.
Edie felt a sickening guilt creeping up into her chest. She was certain she knew exactly why Aunt Roberta disapproved of Fliss. It would be the same thing it always was with grown-ups. Her – Edie. The illegitimate, unwanted baby girl, born when Fliss wasn’t married.
“Don’t look so worried. Uncle Peter will be there too,” said Fliss. “You’ll love Pete. We used to go with him to the seaside sometimes. Do you remember?”
Edie shook her head. She had only been about two or three years old at the time. But at least he didn’t seem to disapprove of her. He sent a postal order on her birthday every year.
“I’m sorry, sweetie.” Fliss laid her hand on Edie’s arm. “I wish I could come with you. But there’s something I have to do. Something important.”
“What is it?” asked Edie slowly. She knew she wasn’t going to like the answer.
“I’m going to fly planes again,” said Fliss.
“Fly?” Edie stared at her mother. “You’re going to fly planes for the war?” She felt as if her knees might give way beneath her. “But it’s so dangerous.”
Fliss squeezed her arm. “I have to, darling. They’re asking women to help out now.” Edie could hear the excitement in her mother’s voice. She felt a stab of jealousy. Fliss loved flying more than anything. Perhaps even more than looking after her, she thought angrily.
Edie stopped dead in her tracks. “You knew all along!” she said, suddenly realizing that this wasn’t something Fliss had thought of on the spur of the moment at all. It had nothing to do with those poor people at the Café de Paris, or school closing, or any of the rest of it. That was all just an excuse. Fliss must have been planning it for weeks.
“They want any of us who can fly to join the Air Transport Auxiliary,” said Fliss quietly, but her cheeks were flushed. “The chaps in the RAF need planes delivered to them from all over the country. I’ll be bringing aircraft from factories and airfields and flying them to wherever they’re needed.” She tried to take Edie’s hand, but Edie shrugged her off. “It’s all part of the war effort, poppet. It’s the right thing to do.”
Edie sighed, blinking back tears. It was pointless to argue with Fliss when she’d decided something.
“Stupid, rotten war!” she muttered under her breath. In spite of all Fliss’s promises that they would stay together, she was being shunted off to the country to live with a strange aunt she didn’t know. Meanwhile, Fliss was going to risk her life flying planes and Edie knew there was nothing she could do to stop her.
Chapter Two
Smoke, Steam and Suitcases
The hustle and bustle of King’s Cross seemed to Edie more like an army base than a train station. Soldiers in khaki uniform were hurrying to and from trains or sitting on their kit bags smoking cigarettes and laughing.
The last few days had been a constant flurry of activity, with both Edie and Fliss packing and preparing to go away. Fliss was already wearing her smart navy-blue Air Transport Auxiliary uniform with gold ATA wings on her chest. She looked beautiful and men turned to stare as they squeezed through the crowds. One young soldier even whistled as they passed. Edie wished they’d all stop gawping. She wanted Fliss to herself – just for these last few minutes before the train.
When they eventually reached the platform, the train was already billowing smoke; clouds of it were swirling up to the station roof like fog.
“It’s as if the train’s a mighty dragon!” Edie shouted above the noise.
Fliss laughed and her face broke into a wide smile. “That’s what we used to call them when I was your age.” She crouched down and straightened the gas mask hanging in its little cardboard box around Edie’s neck. “When we lived at Three Chimneys, Aunt Roberta, Uncle Peter and I used to wave to the 9.15 train
