Constance closed her eyes and imagined she could taste it. She opened them deciding it was time she gave him a run for his money. ‘You can’t beat a piece of fresh-from-the-sea fried haddock, chips and mushy peas from Mrs Hennings Fish Shop either.’ It was one of the few treats the war hadn’t managed to snaffle.
‘Mushy peas?’ Henry raised an eyebrow.
‘Halt! Who goes there?’ A voice shouted across the sand from the Esplanade and Constance glanced anxiously up at the seawall. A sailor manning the old Victorian gun emplacement shouted from the beachside entrance to Puckpool Camp. She hadn’t paid attention to how far they’d walked.
‘Wing Commander Henry Johnson, Royal Canadian Airforce, and Constance Downer of Ryde.’
Constance felt in her pocket for her identity card which she handed to the sailor to examine. He glanced at it, and satisfied passed it back.
‘As you were,’ the voice said, and Constance flushed seeing him wink at Henry.
‘All this talk about food’s made me hungry.’
‘Me too.’ Constance agreed, and as they turned back retracing their footsteps in the sand the sun dipped low, and the tide began its stealthy ascent up the beach. By the time they barrelled into Mrs Hennings Fish Shop, it was dark.
‘Good evening Mrs Hennings. Could we have two fried fillets of haddock please and chips for two with a serving of mushy peas please?’
‘Hey.’ Henry laughed. ‘I never agreed to the mushy peas!’
Chapter 17
‘Okay, I’m still on the fence about the mushy peas, but I will hold my hand up to that being the best piece of fish I’ve ever had,’ Henry said, as they strolled toward Pier View House. He was mindful of making sure Constance was home by curfew.
Constance groaned. ‘I ate too much, my tummy hurts.’
Henry laughed. ‘There were rather a lot of chips.’
‘Mrs Hennings is not normally that generous. I think she rather took a shine to you.’ Constance had thought the woman who at times looked like she would rather be anywhere than in her fish shop with her swollen ankles and red work-worn hands had seemed to prance from fryer to till at the sight of Henry. She wasn’t the only one either. The two girls who’d been huddled over a shared plate of chips in the corner began giggling and stealing surreptitious glances over at him. Henry seemed oblivious to the effect his tall, handsome presence was having. Constance eyed the girls, recognizing one of them as Flo Brown from the factory. She was a terrible flirt, or so the factory gossips said. She held onto Henry’s arm just a little tighter.
It had been a wonderful evening, she thought with a happy sigh, as they passed by the edifice of the Royal Kent Hotel once more deliberately slowing her pace because she didn’t want it to end. The only sour note had been the two lads who’d brushed past them deliberately knocking into Henry as they left the fish shop.
‘Hey watch it mate!’ Henry called, as they laughed and carried on their way but Constance pulled him inside to the warm glow of the shop. She knew some of the local lads were envious of the foreign boys and the almost exotic appeal they held for the girls of Wight. ‘Ignore them, Henry, I know Willy Parker’s mother and believe me he doesn’t know any better.’
It was ten minute to nine when they reached the little side gate beside A Stitch in Time.
‘It’s not that I want to cut our night short Connie it’s just that I want to be sure your father is happy for me to call on you again.’
Constance felt a thrill run through her at his words; he wanted to see her again! It was just as well because she’d die if he didn’t feel the same way as she did. ‘Thank you for a lovely evening.’ She smiled up at him. The evening had been more magical than she’d imagined it would be as she’d tossed and turned each night from Monday through to the wee hours of Friday morning. Although in her dream date she hadn’t gotten a green smudge from the pea she’d dropped down her front on Ginny’s cardigan. How she was going to get it out, she didn’t know!
Her hand reluctantly reached out for the latch, but her gaze never left Henry’s. She didn’t want the evening to finish. It was far too early, she thought mentally poking her tongue out at her father. All the other girls didn’t have to be home until ten thirty. It wasn’t fair. But all thoughts of her father and anyone else for that matter vanished as Henry gently cupped her face in his hands, and his eyes seemed to darken as he looked at her with an expression she couldn’t read. Instinctively she tilted her chin raising her mouth toward his. She tasted salt as their lips connected and a jolt, almost electrical in its intensity, coursed through her. As she pressed herself against Henry, she sank deeper into her first kiss. Her body seemed to no longer belong to her, and she fell further into the realm of a foreign desire not knowing and not caring where it took her.
The jarring sound of a tin hitting tin caused them both to jump apart as it shattered the still night air. Constance was breathless, and she took a few seconds to regain her equilibrium unable to look at Henry for fear of falling off that abyss she’d been teetering on. Her father never put the rubbish out this late at night. It was his way, she knew, of making sure there was no funny business going on out the front of A Stitch in Time!
‘You’d best go in.’ Henry’s voice was ragged around the edges.
Constance nodded but made
