Camomile Lawn by Mary Wesley Page B

escorts, in the event mostly men. She was met by soldiers, sailors, airmen, Free French, Dutch, Poles, on one occasion a turbanned Sikh and latterly by Americans. It never occurred to her to wonder how these strangers recognized her. If she had thought she might have supposed Polly had shown a snapshot. She never knew that Polly’s orders were, ‘Look for a thin chinky child with black hair and slant eyes who looks like a Siamese cat. She stands out among the goosey English.’
    At half term in 1940 she was met by the twins, who greeted her with cries of ‘Hullo, Soph-ophy-ophy, give us a kiss. You’re not to go home, you’re to spend half term with us.’
    ‘Oh, goody, where?’
    ‘With Polly. We are building her a shelter. You can help,’ said Paul.
    ‘She says she’ll never go down to a shelter so we are reinforcing her bed.’
    ‘When are these raids, then?’ Sophy had learned to be sceptical.
    ‘They will come, never fear,’ said the twins, bundling her into a very old car they had bought for five pounds. ‘We can’t have our Polly in more danger than she need be.’
    ‘She hasn’t noticed,’ said David to Paul. ‘She hasn’t noticed our elevation, have you, Sophy?’
    ‘What?’ said Sophy.
    ‘You haven’t noticed us.’
    ‘You look exactly the same, more so than ever. Oh, I see,’ she exclaimed. ‘You’ve become officers. How grand!’
    ‘What else?’
    ‘Wings. Oh gosh, you’ve got wings!’
    ‘Pilot Officers with wings on leave. We’re posted. We’ve been home, now we’ve got three days in London.’
    ‘Any news of Oliver?’ Sophy did not want to ask but did.
    ‘No,’ they said soberly. ‘No. He’ll be all right, bound to be.’
    They showed her the shelter, a corrugated iron canopy above Polly’s bed, strongly supported by struts and stays. ‘A wartime four-poster.’
    ‘Is she pleased?’
    ‘She doesn’t know. You can paint it while we finish it off. We could only get moss green; it doesn’t look too bad. We want to get it finished before she gets back from her office.’
    Sophy enjoyed that hot June day making sandwiches, answering the telephone when Polly called to find out whether she had arrived and later telephoning Calypso, asking her to come round and see the twins.
    ‘I can’t. I’m in bed with a throat, can hardly speak. Give them my love.’
    The twins opened the windows to lessen the smell of paint and sent Sophy to Harrods to buy ribbon. As children they had built a tree house in the Rectory garden; reinforcing the bed recaptured for a day their childhood delight. When Polly came home the canopy was overhanging the bed, the struts bound around with pink and yellow ribbons. She said: ‘Oh, twins!’ She put her arms round them. ‘You darlings! I love it and I love you.’
    ‘We must have you safe,’ they said, hugging her.
    ‘Christ Almighty! What is going on?’ Walter, carrying a bottle of gin, appeared from nowhere.
    ‘Walter, I thought you were in Portsmouth.’ Polly hugged him.
    ‘I was. I’m on my way to Plymouth to another bloody destroyer. It’s total hell, sadistic bastards.’
    ‘Who?’
    ‘The Admiralty. Can I stay the night? I’ll take you all out to dinner.’
    ‘It’s your home as much as mine.’ Polly was indignant.
    ‘I keep meeting people who’ve stayed the night. I just wondered whether there was a bed.’
    ‘They are often your friends.’
    ‘Let’s go out while the smell blows away. Sophy, you’ve grown.’
    Sophy felt happy with Polly, the twins and Walter with his squashy face. She was glad Calypso couldn’t come, glad a sore throat kept her away.
    Walter rang her up. ‘Says not to come near her, she feels rotten. Must be, she’s missing some do she was going to with Hector. She had been looking forward to it, says she hopes he’ll be all right on his own. Quite the little wife, our Calypso.’
    ‘Yes,’ said Polly, ‘er—yes.’ Then, ‘Come on, Sophy, put on a pretty dress, I’m going to.’
    Calypso