When they were all sitting at the large dining table one of the male officers repeated even more forcefully that they were not to discuss anything they did or saw under any circumstances.
As they weren’t allowed to make telephone calls or write letters or even walk in the grounds there was no chance that any of them could break the rules.
*
The days became weeks and Ellie became more adept at the task of locating the little blobs of light. She now knew they were called ‘echoes’. She was puzzled by the compass scale on the locating control but used it as instructed.
Already three of the girls had left but fortunately her roommates were still there. As the course came to an end they were told to assemble in the lecture hall where what they had been doing would become clear.
The Commanding Officer stood up and smiled at them. ‘Thank you for your hard work and for putting up with the monotony and lack of exercise. What you have been doing is learning to use radar interception.’
Ellie had vaguely heard about this new invention. It was something that could detect enemy aircraft approaching and would give the RAF a huge advantage over the enemy. To have been involved in something so worthwhile made the three weeks of boredom and incarceration acceptable.
‘Imagine that,’ Daisy said as they left the lecture room. ‘We’ll be doing really valuable work – much better than anything else that was on offer when we signed up.’
‘If I can’t fly then this is the next best thing. Being able to keep our boys safe in the air is a great job. Do you think we’ll get any leave before we’re sent to our postings?’ Ellie said.
‘I doubt it. Someone said there’s going to be a leaving party tonight. There will be music, alcohol and men,’ Mary said gleefully.
‘I think that a couple of the girls have already got to know their instructors quite well. The chap we had suffered from bad breath so we had to keep facing front and I don’t really know what he looks like.’
The others laughed. ‘Any port in a storm, Ellie. I’m not averse to a bit of how’s your father as long as they smell a bit sweeter than the one we had teaching us,’ Mary said.
‘I think we were unlucky because somebody told me they’d had a nice bit of slap and tickle with their bloke.’
‘I only intend to canoodle with a Brylcreem boy, officers only for me.’
‘Daisy, I’m shocked. I’m glad that I’m engaged to Greg and don’t have to worry about being chased by officers or other ranks.’
‘I’m not surprised you said yes, he’s a bit of all right,’ Mary said as she led the way into their accommodation.
*
The following day Ellie was posted with her friends to a radar station at Rye on the south coast. They were received enthusiastically by the male operatives as these poor chaps had been working every day without respite.
The nearest town was miles away and none of the men had been allowed leave because of the shortage of trained personnel. There was no suitable accommodation at the camp so they were billeted with a local doctor and his wife. This meant a two-mile walk morning and evening, but it did mean she was getting plenty of fresh air and exercise now.
Another girl was added to their group as they had to work in teams of four. Vanessa was an ex-deb and talked as if she had a plum in her mouth. Despite her initial reservations Ellie thought she was a good egg.
The first morning they were escorted to the hut where they were to work. Although it was a mile or two from the coast the bitter wind from the channel battered its wooden sides relentlessly.
‘Right, ladies, this is how things work,’ they were told by a depressed looking male officer. ‘You will work eight hours on and sixteen hours off on your watch. One of you will operate the screen, one fix the position of the echo and inform central control. The third is to record everything in a log and the fourth to act as telephonist and tea maker. Is that clear?’
‘Yes, sir. How do we decide which duty we have?’
‘Simpson, isn’t it?’ Ellie nodded wondering how he knew her name. ‘You change your duty every two hours. It doesn’t matter where you start – you’ll do each task in a shift.’
No one minded who did what first. Her first duty was as a telephonist. The hut was totally blacked out, rocked in the wind from the sea, and even with greatcoats, scarves and balaclavas on they were still cold. Only constant mugs of hot, sweet tea kept them from freezing to death.
Occasionally Ellie had the energy to go into town when her time off coincided with daylight – but usually she was too tired to do anything but catch up on her sleep. So the months drifted past with only her weekly letters from Greg and Jack to break the monotony. Nothing much was happening to either of them and they were both bored and eager for the war to start in earnest. The only telephone available was in town so calls were now a thing of the past.
‘It’s not so bad being in this beastly hut now the weather’s improved,’ Vanessa said as she and Ellie sipped their tea and Daisy and Mary got on with the real work. Answering the telephone and scribbling down anything that was spotted on the screen were less stressful than the other two.
They were conversing in whispers although the other two couldn’t hear them as they were wearing headsets.
‘It might as well be winter the amount of sunlight we get to sit in. It’s May, a
