‘Sir,’ she said confidently, with a self-assured salute. ‘May I speak with you, briefly?’
Air Vice-Marshall Lloyd, a clean-shaven bulldog of a man in his late forties frowned at her. ‘Are you one of the two WAAF ladies I had drafted in to help with the islands Y-Service?’
‘Yes, sir,’ Elsie replied. ‘That’s right.’
He smiled. Thank God, he smiled. ‘How’s it going?’
‘If you don’t mind my saying, sir,’ Elsie said, ‘there are a lot of problems that need urgent attention.’
‘Go on,’ he encouraged.
‘Well, sir. Between eight o’clock in the evening and eight o’clock in the morning we have no operators listening in, so the Luftwaffe and the Règio Aeronautica can say whatever they like over the airwaves and nobody hears. And believe me, sir, they say a lot during those night-time hours. Second of all, we’re missing a great deal of R/T because of the lack of skilled operators. We need to at least double the number of operators in each station, who can maintain a twenty-four-hour watch. We also need telephone lines to be installed in all field units with a direct line to the Lascaris War Rooms. So much vital operational intelligence is taking an unacceptable amount of time to reach the plotting board. Last of all, much of the R/T traffic that I’ve amassed whilst on the island can only have been gathered from enemy Y-stations based on Sicily, meaning that we have very poor radio security. There are other points, too, which I have detailed in my report, sir.’
Lloyd raised his eyebrows and looked in consternation at the other men stood around the table. ‘And where is this report, exactly?’
‘In a giant tower of useless paperwork in Wing Commander Shorter’s office,’ Elsie answered audaciously.
‘Like that is it?’ Lloyd said. He turned back to the men. ‘McGhie, go and fetch me that report.’ He paused and eyed Elsie. ‘Thank you for your efforts, Assistant Section Officer…?’
‘Finch.’
‘Assistant Section Officer Finch. I shall be commending you to the Air Ministry. Thank you,’ he said, extending his hand towards her. He shook her hand rigorously and then paced from the restaurant with giant purposeful strides.
‘Christ, that was brave,’ Woody murmured with admiration, as Elsie sat back down. ‘You could have got put up on a charge for that.’
Elsie shrugged nonchalantly. ‘It needed saying. If he even puts half of our recommendations into practice the island will be a safer place.’
‘Maybe then I will live to see the war out and come and find you and marry you,’ he said with a grin.
She slid her hands out, finding his fingers and locking them into hers. The hopeless desperation of stepping outside of their doomed reality and being in Woody’s arms forever began to simmer inside of her. It was time to leave. ‘I must go,’ she said quietly. Her words caused his fingers to twitch, to grasp onto her for just that one moment longer.
A swollen chasm in their conversation continued until they were standing in the pouring rain outside the hotel. Elsie guessed that, like her, he was struggling to match his feelings to the trite worn-out phrases that were coming to mind. Was there even a point in trying to express her feelings to a man that she would likely never see again? She didn’t even know his real name and he was on the verge of proposing to her.
Elsie stepped up and kissed him. Their lips locked together and they kissed with a fervency that she had previously never known.
It was the coldness that eventually forced her away from him. She shivered. Time had elapsed but she had no idea exactly how much.
‘I still don’t know your first name,’ Elsie commented.
‘Keep guessing…’
Elsie smiled. ‘Goodbye.’
‘Goodbye, Elsie.’
Her tears melded with the rain, becoming lost, washed down the road in the muddy streams and out into the sea.
She turned away from him and began to walk back towards the War Rooms.
By late afternoon, the weather had improved, the rain clouds having been buffeted northwards towards Italy.
Elsie had said goodbye to Aileen, then had had a very brief conversation with Shorter, in which he expressed his displeasure at her having gone above his head.
She stood now beside a low stone wall overlooking Kalafrana Bay. The Sunderland flying boat on which she would leave the island bobbed gently on the still waters beside a narrow wooden jetty.
She stared out to sea, wondering what the next phase of her life would bring. She recalled her conversations with Woody that morning and regarded her left hand. Did she have the courage to divorce Laurie? Really? She gently slid the ring from her finger, encircling it in the fingers and thumb of her right hand. Placing the ring down on the wall in front of her, she examined her left hand. It felt odd yet strangely liberated. She picked the ring up again, a surge of adrenalin urging her to launch it into the sea, bringing her marriage to an end. But she couldn’t do it.
She looked at it again, then turned around. The streets were bustling with locals snatching the rare opportunity for something resembling normality. Elsie searched the crowds then spotted her: an old lady, bent over with tattered clothes. She darted across the street and reached out to touch the old lady’s arm and received a suspicious glare from her dirty toothless face. Elsie smiled, pressed her wedding ring into her hands then crossed back over, collected her suitcase and headed down the jetty towards the seaplane.
‘Elsie Finch?’ the pilot asked from beside the open rear door.
‘That’s me.’
‘Climb in and we’ll get going.’
She smiled and stepped inside. As she did so, she thought that she heard her name being called. She turned to see Woody waving from the place
