“Good idea. I can’t wait to hear what you’ve been up to,” said Edie. “Send the Twiglets my love… ”
They listened as she scampered away down the stairs.
Gus pushed the door closed with his foot.
“Go on, tell me,” said Edie, cradling her warm mug of tea.
“There are four crew on a Junkers plane,” Gus began to explain. “A pilot, an observer, a wireless operator and a gunner.”
“Yes. But what about our one?” said Edie impatiently. “What happened to him?”
“I think they must’ve caught him,” said Gus. “I heard Colonel Crowther telling Uncle Peter just now. He said there were at least two bodies in the wreckage and a Home Guard unit a couple of miles the other side of Stacklepoole found a German airman trying to steal a pail of milk from a dairy. And there’s talk of another stowing away on a train as far as Leeds, but there’ve been so many rumours the last few days, it’s been hard to keep up.”
“And what’ll they do with them now they’ve caught them?” said Edie, remembering Len Snigson’s terrible boast to skin any enemy airmen alive.
“Colonel Crowther says they’ll be sent to a prisoner-of-war camp,” Gus explained. “They won’t be harmed. The Germans do the same with captured British airman. Both sides will release them all at the end of the war.”
“Well, that’s not so bad,” said Edie. At least their young airman would be safe now. Thank goodness fair-minded men like Colonel Crowther were in charge of the Home Guard, not bullies like Donny and Len Snigson.
“Easy for you to say!” Gus kicked at the skirting board. “You’re not the one penned in behind barbed wire, living in a chicken hutch for the next ten years… ”
“Ten years?” said Edie. “I’m sure the war won’t go on that long.”
But Gus seemed suddenly furious. He snatched the tray with her empty breakfast things. “I better get these washed up. Aunt Roberta’s gone to work and Maisie’s off with the flu.” He stomped away down the stairs.
“Wait! What’s wrong?” Edie called after him, but there was no reply. She lay back on her pillow and sighed. She couldn’t work out what he was upset about at all. He was so odd and moody sometimes. He ought to be pleased. If their airman had been safely captured – and it sounded as if he had – then at least the terrible unpatriotic lie they had told about not seeing him didn’t matter so much any more. No harm had been done.
Edie spent the rest of the morning sitting up in bed, cutting strings of paper dolls from an old newspaper with Greta. At lunchtime, Aunt Roberta came home to check on her.
She brought her a bowl of strong beef tea made with a piece of meat donated by the butcher. Not quite the steak he had promised, but good enough to boil. “It will build your strength up,” said Aunt Roberta. “And no running around for another day or two either.” Then she sat on the end of the bed and told Edie how she used to love to play at being nurse when she was a little girl. “Mother got sick when we first came to Three Chimneys and the doctor always encouraged beef tea.”
“Do you think that’s why you decided to be a real nurse when you grew up?” asked Edie.
“I do like feeling useful,” said Aunt Roberta. “I knew I wanted to train properly as soon as the Great War came along. All the boys I knew, like Peter – and our friend Jim – were going off to fight. I wanted to be able to do something too. To help them when they were injured. One heard such terrible stories.”
“Weren’t you very afraid?” asked Edie. She too had heard terrible stories about that war and knew the nurses had to work close to the fierce fighting in the trenches.
“I was terrified,” said Aunt Roberta truthfully. “We were often up to our knees in thick mud with no electric light and very little medicine to help the wounded men. But it was better to be afraid and doing something than just to be afraid. Think about what you did when you saved the train. I am sure you were frightened.”
“I was,” agreed Edie. When she closed her eyes, she could still see the roaring train, thundering towards her. She could almost smell the smoke.
“And yet,” said Aunt Roberta, “it would have been far worse just to stand and watch.”
Edie nodded. It was true. “I think that’s how Fliss feels about flying,” she said. “She knows her job is dangerous. But she has to do her bit.”
“Hmm.” Aunt Roberta stood up. “I suppose so,” she said. But her mood had changed instantly, as if a switch had been flicked.
“And she drove an ambulance in the last war,” said Edie, suddenly feeling like she had to leap to Fliss’s defence.
“That was different,” said Aunt Roberta. “You weren’t born then. She should have thought about that.”
“What do you mean?” said Edie. Her chest felt tight. It had been so long since she had seen that look of disapproval on Aunt Roberta’s face – but her forehead was deeply creased and the frown between her eyebrows was back.
“A baby is a very big responsibility,” she sighed. “Fliss was on her own. All I’m saying is that she ought to have thought about that before she… ”
“No!” Edie cut her off. “I don’t want to talk about this any more,” she said. “I’m tired.”
She knew what Aunt Roberta was going to say and she couldn’t bear to hear it. She was going to say Fliss should have thought before she had a baby on her own. Edie turned her face to the wall. She’d felt as if she’d grown so close to Aunt Roberta since she had come here, but all that made no difference in the end – Aunt Roberta still thought it would have been better if
