was glad they’d both been warned about the noise the rescuers might make because it was unnerving. The sides of their space beneath the stairs kept groaning and shaking, and plaster and brick dust began to trickle down on them. Jenny found herself holding her breath, expecting any minute for the lot to crash in on them, burying them both. She wondered how Linda was bearing up against the new danger that seemed to be around them, and when she felt a small hand tighten around hers, she knew the level of panic within her. ‘Don’t worry,’ she said. ‘They know what they’re doing.’
‘I know,’ Linda’s voice was a mere whisper. ‘My legs are beginning to pain me again.’
Jenny wasn’t surprised. They had been trapped a long time; small wonder the morphine had begun to wear off. ‘If my mom was here, we’d be singing together,’ Linda said with a stifled sob. Jenny felt she had to take the child’s mind off the pain in her legs if she could, so though she hated any reference to Linda’s mother, in case it should lead to awkward questions, she said, ‘Did you used to sing a lot?’
‘Sometimes,’ Linda said. ‘Once we sang all the time but that was before Mom married that Ted Prosser, and then we stopped ’cos he didn’t like it. Mom’s got a lovely voice and we had a good old sing-song in the shelter, for the babbies you know. They was scared to death – so were we really – but in a way it was worse for them, ’cos they don’t understand nothing do they?’
‘No,’ Jenny said, and before Linda could say anything else about the little boys that Jenny had seen crushed to death, she went on, ‘why don’t you sing here for me, now?’
‘On me own?’ Linda said.
‘Why not?’
‘I’m no good without Mom,’ Linda said. ‘And I’d feel proper daft.’
‘Why?’ Jenny said. ‘It isn’t as if I can even see you.’
Linda considered Jenny’s words. It was true, no one could see her and no one but Jenny would hear her, either, and she could often forget things when she sang. Perhaps the pain in her bloody legs wouldn’t be so bad either. ‘I’ll sing for you,’ she said. ‘It’s me mom’s favourite. It ain’t mine. I like something a bit jollier, but she sings along with this whenever it’s on the wireless.’
‘What is it?’
‘“A Nightingale Sang in Berkeley Square”,’ Linda said, and without another word she opened her mouth and began, ‘“When true lovers meet in Mayfair, so the legends tell …”’
Jenny was stunned by the beauty and clarity of the voice. It was so sweet and clear and perfectly in tune, it moved Jenny to tears. For a child to lie flat on her back for so many hours in total darkness and in dreadful pain, all alone until Jenny had eventually reached her, and still to be able to sing like she did, she thought was truly wonderful. Jenny realized, as Patty had, that Linda had a great gift.
Outside, the raw winter’s day was beginning again. The pearly grey dawn eventually gave some light to the rescuers, some of whom had toiled through the night. Then the rain began, pounding the pavements and stinging their faces in icy spears, the wet making the rubble pile slippery and slimy and more unstable than ever. It was hard to continue to move the rubbish away with wet hands, their fingers aching and made clumsy with the bitter cold.
And yet, no one wanted to give up now the girls had been located and it had been established both of them were alive and well. Those who had work that day had gone back home to prepare for it. But there were others to take their place.
And then into that grey, depressing, rain-sodden morning, came the sound of singing, and what singing! ‘It’s one of the girls down there,’ one man remarked.
‘She sounds like a nightingale herself,’ another commented. A third rubbed his hands over his eyes and said, ‘I call that real courage. Let’s put our backs into this and get those two girls out quick.’
Dr Sanders, who’d been home for a brief rest before morning surgery, returned after it to see what progress had been made. By then Linda was singing, ‘I’m going to hang out the washing on the Seigfried Line’, after a rendering of ‘The Quartermaster’s Stores’, and ‘We’ll Meet Again’.
Dr Sanders knew who it was. Beattie had told him of Linda’s love of singing and the quality of her voice, but he was amazed she was still able to sing after being incarcerated for so long. ‘How much longer?’ he asked impatiently. ‘That painkiller I gave the girl to take in will be wearing off soon.’
‘Another half hour should do it, Doc,’ one of the men said. ‘You don’t want us to lift the stairs up off her yet, do you?’
‘Not till I examine her,’ Dr Sanders said. He wasn’t sure of the extent of the damage. Linda’s legs could be smashed to pulp and once the stairs were lifted, she could bleed to death. It might even be that one, or both, of the young girl’s legs would have to be amputated. God, he hoped that wasn’t the case. But then, only the previous week, he’d dined with a friend and colleague from London, who’d just done such an operation on a young boy. The boy had been caught in an air raid and pinned down as the building fell on him. Dr Sanders’ friend had amputated both legs below the knee on the dust-laden pavement, with only the light from a couple of shielded hurricane lamps, and with bombs dropping all around them. It made Dr Sanders’ blood run cold to think of it. ‘I’m off to do a few visits,’ he said. ‘I’ll be back in a little while to see how you’re doing. Send for me if you need me before; my receptionist will know where I am.’
‘OK, Doc.’ The man who’d spoken watched the doctor walk away and sighed. He wouldn’t want his job in this war for all the tea in China.
Linda eventually stopped. ‘I can’t sing any more,’ she said. Jenny heard her breath coming in short gasps and knew the pain had taken over again. She could do nothing but hold her close and pray. Slowly the conversation above became distinguishable from the low rumble heard previously. Now she could hear actual words and she knew any minute they would break through. The darkness was not so dense now, she noticed. It was grey rather than deep dense black. Then suddenly it was over and light flooded in. A cheery face looked down at her. He looked exhausted and had red-rimmed eyes, but his face near split in two when he saw the girls cuddled up together. ‘By God!’ he exclaimed. ‘Have you out in a jiffy, ducks. Who was it giving the concert then?’
‘Linda,’ Jenny said getting to her feet. ‘But she’s in terrible pain again now.’
‘Doc’s here,’ the man said. ‘You hurt at all?’
‘No, not really,’ Jenny said, shaking herself free of the blanket and struggling to her feet. But her head swam as she stood up and she staggered like a drunk as she made her way over to the hole the man had made.
‘Catch hold of me, ducks,’ the man said. ‘We’ll get you out in two shakes of a lamb’s tail.’ Jenny lifted up her hands and the man whistled when he saw them. ‘Thought you said you wasn’t injured?’ he said. ‘You won’t be able to hold anything much with these hands. I’ll catch hold of your arms. Don’t worry, I’ll soon have you up.’
And he did. Another man came to help and they hauled her upwards. For a moment she was suspended in mid-air, and then she lay on the top of the rubble, panting. She gulped at the fresh air thankfully and didn’t mind the numbing cold, nor the icy rain that was still pelting down.
‘How’s the child?’ the doctor asked Jenny, as she tried to stand
