rationing, you mean?’
‘Clothes rationin’,’ Vi affirmed solemnly. ‘Imagine the Government doin’ a thing like that, eh?’
It had happened suddenly, just three weeks ago. The British public had opened its morning papers to the stark announcement that clothing and footwear were rationed. Coupon values had been placed upon every conceivable article, and henceforth it would be illegal to buy anything without surrendering the appropriate number of clothing coupons. Briefly, it stated that sixty-six coupons had been considered adequate for normal use. The bomb-shell exploded when it added that those sixty-six coupons must last for a whole year.
‘It is outrageous,’ the Countess had written to her daughter. ‘How is one to be decently clothed when one must hand over sixteen coupons for a coat and five for a pair of shoes? We shall all be in rags …’
‘It’s fair, I suppose,’ Jane argued. ‘Clothes were getting very expensive and in short supply too. Now everyone will at least get a fair share.’
‘But three whole coupons for a pair of silk stockings,’ Lucinda wailed. ‘My mother was always catching hers on her rings. She went through any amount of stockings in a week. She won’t be able to do that now.’
‘She’ll have to go without, then – or paint her legs, as it suggested in the magazine. Gravy-browning is supposed to be good.’
‘Good grief!’ Mama bare-legged! Lucinda shook with silent joy. Gravy-browning? But it really wasn’t funny, come to think of it, since poor Pa would be the whipping boy for the silk stocking shortage. One thing was certain, though. Worrying about clothing coupons would at least make Mama forget the invasion for a while.
‘What’s so funny?’ Vi demanded.
‘My mother. Having to paint her legs.’ Lucinda’s smile gave way to a throaty laugh. ‘But she’ll find a way round it.’
She would, too. Lady Kitty’s wardrobes were crammed with clothes, and she would give those for which she had no further use to someone with little money – in exchange for some of their coupons, of course. That it was against the law would not worry milady in the least. The Countess of Donnington upheld only those laws with which she agreed, and the rationing of footwear and clothing and the issuing of clothing coupons were not among them.
‘It’ll be hard on my sister,’ Vi considered. ‘Got two kids, Mary has. Just imagine – eight coupons for a pair of pyjamas and five for a blouse and seven for a skirt. And you’ve even got to give up a coupon for two ounces of knitting wool as well. I don’t know how she’ll manage. Go without, herself, I shouldn’t wonder.’
‘I suppose we’re lucky, missing all that.’ Jane remembered the three pairs of London-tan stockings she had left behind her. It was useless to try to hoard silk stockings, stated the women’s magazines. They deteriorated with time, and the only way to prolong their life was to store them carefully in airtight containers and only wear them on special occasions. It was patriotic to go bare-legged, insisted fashion editors, whereupon almost the entire female population of the United Kingdom had wrapped their precious stockings in cellophane and placed them, sighing, in screw-topped jars in dark cupboards.
Furtively Jane scratched an itching calf. Some women had all the luck. To be stockingless at this moment, she thought fervently, would be nothing short of bliss.
The canteen began to empty. The Gordon Highlanders had already left, the airmen from the corner table had hoisted kitbags to shoulders and gone their separate ways, and the soldier who had spent the entire evening writing letters called a goodnight and walked out into the darkness. At the counter the elderly lady took off her pinafore and put on her coat.
‘I’m away to catch the last tram,’ she smiled. ‘The front door is locked now but the caretaker will let you out at the back, so you’ll be welcome to stay for a wee while longer. Good night, girls. Take care of yourselves.’
‘I suppose we’d better all be making tracks,’ Vi murmured reluctantly. ‘All got our respirators?’
Lose a respirator and the cost was deductible from pay. Respirators were a nuisance; it was a punishable offence for any member of the armed forces to be caught without one. Respirators had to go everywhere with them, like the Ancient Mariner and his albatross.
‘Are you wanting away, ladies?’ A white-haired man limped ahead of them and opened a door at the rear of the room. ‘You’ll take care in the blackout, now.’
‘We will. We’ll be fine, ta.’ Vi looked at the medal ribbons, proudly worn on the shabby jacket. Earned in the last war, no doubt, and that stiff, awkward leg too.
They wished him good night, then stood a while, blinking in the darkness, listening to the slam of the door bolts. The dense blackness lifted a little and they were able to pick out the skyline and the dim glow of white-edged pavements and white-ringed lampposts. The blackout was complete. Even torches had to be covered with paper and car headlights painted over, except for a small cross of light at their centres. They would all be troglodytes before the war was over, thought Lucinda, with eyes that stood out on little stalks.
Ahead of them a match flared and a lighted cigarette glowed briefly like a small bright beacon, reminding them of streetlamps and bonfires and shop windows blazing with light. One day those lights would go on again, but not just yet, Lucinda thought sadly.
‘It’s very quiet, isn’t it?’ Jane felt with the toe of her shoe for the kerb edge. ‘Was it this quiet when we came, Vi?’
‘Well, no, but it’s late now, innit? Past eleven, I shouldn’t wonder. Don’t worry. We’ll soon be at the station, and it’ll be noisy enough there.’
They walked carefully, staring ahead into the night.
‘Did we pass a row of dustbins on the way here?’
‘Don’t know. Don’t remember any,’ Vi admitted dubiously.
‘No more did I. I hope I’m wrong but I – I think we’re going the wrong way.’
‘What makes you say that?’ True, it had been reasonably light when they left the station, and Glasgow, its war scars softened by the approaching night, had seemed like Liverpool to Vi. Here, too, were boarded-up shopfronts and sandbagged doorways. Here, as in her own city, bomb-ravaged buildings stood stark against the glow of a sinking sun, strangely, tragically beautiful. But now the sameness was gone. These were not the streets and alleys Vi knew and felt easy in. Here were unexpected turnings she could not recognize; and there was something else, she thought, suddenly apprehensive.
‘When we left the station, do you remember any trams?’
‘Yes, one.’ Lucinda frowned. ‘Going in the opposite direction, but I haven’t heard any lately.’
‘Well, you wouldn’t. Not now. Don’t you remember the canteen lady leaving to get the last tram?’
‘Yes, queen, I do. But take a look at that road. No tramlines there.’
‘Then we’re lost,’ Lucinda said flatly. ‘It’s because we left by the back door. We went the wrong way, I suppose. It’s easy enough in the blackout. I suppose now we’ve either got to cut through the next side street we come to and try to get to the main road, or turn round and find the canteen
