As Time Goes By by Annie Groves Page B

the owner did, so I’ve bin told.’
    ‘They get some really good bands playing here as well. The lot that are playing tonight have these girl singers. Ever so good, they are; good enough to be on the wireless,’ May chipped in.
    ‘Huh, I dare say I could sound just as good ifI were dressed up in one of them frocks they wear,’ Lynsey informed them sharply.
    ‘You? Don’t forget I’ve heard you singing in the shower,’ May laughed.
    They had reached the top of the stairs, and were having to raise their voices above the noise generated by the people filling the dance hall.
    Somehow they managed to find a vacant table not too far from the band or the dance floor.
    ‘Right, what’s everyone having to drink?’ May demanded as soon as they were seated.
    ‘Mine’s a port and lemon, May,’ Lynsey answered. ‘What are you going to have?’ she asked Sam and Mouse.
    ‘Oh, I … just lemonade for me,’ Mouse told her timidly.
    ‘Have a port and lemon, Sam. I’m going to, and if we all have the same it will make it easier to share the bill,’ Hazel suggested sensibly.
    Sam agreed.
    ‘I’ll go to the bar to give May a hand with the drinks,’ Lynsey offered, standing up.
    ‘Give May a hand – that’s rich. The only reason she’s going to the bar is so that she can eye up the men,’ Hazel told Sam wryly, waving to a group of girls from one of the other dormitories, who had just come in.
    ‘Heavens, virtually the whole of the billet must be here,’ Sam commented in the general chaos and bustle of exchanging names, and the newcomers getting seats and then drinks,
    ‘Almost,’ a lively-looking brunette agreed as shesat down. ‘Apart from Toadie and her favourites.’
    Sam saw the way Mouse shivered and wished the other girl hadn’t mentioned the warrant officer. ‘Don’t worry about her, Mouse,’ Sam whispered.
    ‘I can’t help it,’ Mouse responded. ‘I know it must be hard for someone like you to understand, Sam, but she scares me so much, she and Captain Elland.’ She gave a small shiver. ‘They’re just like my aunt, both of them. I thought it was going to be different in the ATS, that things would be better for me once I’d got away from her, but instead …’ Her eyes filled with tears. ‘I feel so afraid sometimes, Sam, that I’ll never be able to escape from her; no matter what I do and that wherever I go, she’ll make sure that there’s someone there just like her to—’
    ‘What tommyrot,’ Sam stopped her firmly, sensing that she was on the point of hysteria. ‘Toadie’s a bully, I know, but if you ignore her she’ll soon start leaving you alone, don’t you worry.’
    She could see that Mouse wasn’t convinced, but before she could say any more, May leaned over and said, ‘Put a sock in it, you two. They’ve just announced that the singers are coming on and I want to listen to them.’
       
    It was always like this for her in those last few minutes before they went on to sing, Sally acknowledged as she felt the familiar mixture of exhilaration and apprehension gripping her insides, and yet she knew that once she was outthere and actually singing the singing itself would be all that would matter. Even as a little girl she had loved to sing. When she felt unhappy all she had to do to make herself feel better was to sing. Somehow when she was singing there was no room in her heart for misery or worry, or at least there hadn’t been. When she sang she could become another person, a person who had the confidence that her normal self did not. But tonight she was finding it hard to think about anything other than her anxiety over the debt collector’s visit and the message he had given her.
    She knew her neighbours on Chestnut Close, even those as kind as Molly and her mother-in-law, would be horrified at the thought of being in debt. She was afraid that they might be so horrified that they wouldn’t want anything more to do with her. Being in debt was so very shameful, not