Home Front Girls

then. ‘The tap’s run dry. The water-pipe in the road must have ruptured.’
    ‘I’ll go,’ Dotty said as she took a large tin bucket from the woman and headed for the door. Right then anything was preferable to having to watch the look of absolute misery on Mrs Cousins’s face. Once outside she stumbled through the debris until she came to the temporary standpipe that the Army had set up at the end of the road. On one side of the road a woman was digging through the rubble of her home with bare hands trying to find any undamaged possessions and Dotty thought it was one of the most desolate sights she had ever seen as she quickly averted her eyes. She wasn’t sure how much more she could take. Once she had filled the bucket she staggered back the way she had come, wishing with all her heart that she could be a million miles away.
    As the first light of dawn tinged the sky the last casualties were finally transported to hospital. Many of the homeless had already fallen into an exhausted sleep right where they sat but the women then made up makeshift beds for those who were still awake. And then, at last, when they were quite sure that there was nothing else they could do for now and other WVS helpers had come in to take over from them, the four women walked out into the early morning light, bone weary and sick at heart at the sights they had witnessed, promising that they would be back as soon as they had had some rest.
    Miranda had spent most of the night trying to comfort Mrs Cousins. A doctor had seen her and given her a sleeping draught, and at last the poor tormented woman had slept from complete exhaustion. Miranda had fussed over her like a mother hen and now she was drained both mentally and physically.
    There was no thought of the girls turning in to work for that day at least. One of the Red Cross workers had managed to get the address of Mrs Cousins’s sister, who lived in Wales, and Dotty was hoping that she would come to fetch her once the Red Cross were able to contact her. Meanwhile, she would be cared for at the church hall. There was nowhere else for the poor woman to go, and although Dotty was aware that there were those who would condemn her once they found out that she had left her three children in alone, Dotty knew that she had only done it out of desperation.
    ‘I must phone Robert,’ she said now, rubbing her eyes, which were gritty from lack of sleep. ‘He’ll be worried sick if he hears on the news that Hillfields has been bombed. But first I need to go and see what’s left of my flat.’
    ‘Are you sure that’s wise, dear?’ Miranda asked. ‘It can only upset you and you’re more than welcome to stay with us for as long as you like.’
    Dotty shook her head. ‘No, it’s something I need to do. But I do appreciate your offer.’
    They walked in silence through the shattered streets, appalled at the sights they witnessed. Soldiers, who looked almost dead on their feet, were still frantically digging amongst tons of bricks, their ears strained for the least sound that might tell them that a survivor was buried beneath the mess. They had worked tirelessly throughout the long night and Miranda couldn’t help but admire them.
    ‘If our boys at the front are half as good as these men, we’ll win this bloody war eventually,’ she declared defiantly, hoping to give the girls a sliver of hope. Annabelle raised her eyebrows, surprised to hear her mother swear. It was a first, but then so was what they were witnessing.
    Fire engines were still damping down fires, and ash floated in the air, settling on their clothes and making them all appear a ghostly grey. And then at last they turned the corner into Dotty’s road and her flat, or what was left of it, came into view.
    She pressed her knuckles into her mouth to prevent a sob from escaping as it came to her that she now had nothing more than the clothes she was standing up in. The house was merely a towering heap of smoking rubble.
    ‘Come away now.’ Miranda placed her arm about the distressed girl’s shaking shoulders. ‘We’ll go and find the car then we’ll go home and have something to eat and a short rest before we come back to the church hall. We’ll need to get changed as well. We all stink of smoke.’ She refrained from mentioning the bloodstains on their clothes from the many wounded people they had helped during the night. And all the time her mind was firmly fixed on her husband. If things were so awful for