The Forces'' Sweethearts

Book 3: The Bluebird Girls

by Rosie Archer

Genres: Sagas

Synopsis

Gripping, emotional Second World War saga for fans of Annie Groves, Shirley Dickson and Soraya Lane. 1943, and The Bluebird Girls are at the top of their game. They are touring with ENSA, visiting army bases across the world in order to boost the morale of the brave boys fighting in the desert and the jungle. The hours are long and the travelling uncomfortable, but Bea, Rainey and Ivy wouldn't be anywhere else for the world. Then tragedy strikes the group and their little showbusiness family. Their manager, Blackie, and Rainey's mother Jo find themselves with heavy new responsibilities, and the change in circumstances causes the girls themselves to reconsider their lives. For years, singing on stage has been their only dream, and they have made so many sacrifices to get where they are. But now other possibilities - relationships, babies - are on the horizon. Could this be the end for The Bluebird Girls?

Release date: January 9, 2020

Publisher: Quercus Publishing

Print pages: 400

Sample

Chapter One

May 1942

Three dusty, battered three-ton army trucks, accompanied by a jeep, pulled into a scrubby palm clearing where several tents were already erected only miles from the Libyan front. As the vehicles stopped, out spilled a motley crew of entertainers, including three weary girls.

Some of the occupants of the vehicles were wearing ENSA uniforms, the garb of the Entertainments National Service Association and not, as some wags said, ‘Every Night Something Awful’. Some of the men set to building a makeshift stage, using ammunition boxes, petrol cans, planks of wood and oil drums.

‘Not much like the Palladium, is it?’ the blonde girl said, laughing. Her khaki uniform, ‘drab’ they all called the colour, of shirt and trousers was crumpled; her silk tie which had to be worn at all times when not on stage was knotted defiantly in a bow around her neck. Much as the performers loathed the ENSA uniforms, they were all well aware that if enemy action occurred they could get left behind by the armed forces if they were in civilian attire. Possibly they would be shot as spies.

‘No, Bea, but I’ll bet the audience will cheer just as loud, maybe even louder.’ The voice belonged to Rainey, who had jammed her long auburn hair beneath a headscarf in an effort to keep it dust-free and out of her eyes; she hauled a bag containing stage costumes as she clambered down from the lorry.

Bea could see the sadness etched on Rainey’s face. Charlie Smith, the photographer Rainey loved, had had to return to England after news that his shop in Gosport had yet again suffered bomb damage; this time staff and customers were inside.

‘Cheer up, Rainey, you can’t go on stage looking like a wet weekend! Keep yourself busy until you hear from Charlie again. It could be worse – he could have been inside the shop when the bomb fell. Why don’t you check our frocks are still intact and sand-free?’ There was so little room in the trucks for costumes, props and actors. Bea was relieved to see Rainey duck beneath a canvas awning that had suddenly been strung up, hang the ancient and damaged clothes bag on a wooden strut, unzip it and begin her examination of the black glittery dresses. They were designed slightly differently for each of the Bluebirds. A black high-heeled shoe slipped from the bag onto the sand. ‘I bet that’s one of mine!’ shouted Bea. ‘Make sure you shake it, the sand’s a bloody nuisance.’

‘Stop telling me what to do,’ Rainey yelled back, ‘or I’ll put sand in your knickers!’

Bea smiled at her. Rainey’s cheeky reply showed she hadn’t quite lost all of her sense of humour. Bea didn’t like to see Rainey listless. The travelling and the performances over the past months had been relentless; they were all tired.

Charlie Smith had toured with them when they’d been sent to Burma. It had taken four weeks on a troop ship to get there; longer to accept the great heat, the jungle wildlife and the country’s water-logged ground. Its contrast to India’s brightly clothed inhabitants and dusty streets with wandering cows had amazed Bea. Scotland, by comparison, had been wet too, but cold, and the troupe had shivered in Aberdeen, despite piling on extra jumpers. Charlie had become part of the company, sending photographs of the show back home to the English newspapers and doing all he could to promote Blackie Wilson’s Bluebirds and Bombshells Show. Rainey was crazy about Charlie. Not that he was anything to look at, thought Bea. Five foot and a fag paper tall, hair that was pepper-and-salt and thinning. He could also be quite abrasive when speaking with anyone except Rainey, who treated him as though he was Clark Gable’s double. And Charlie? He was besotted by the auburn-haired beauty, lovelight practically beaming from his eyes.

‘Where can we change?’

Bea watched Ivy jump lightly to the sand. Beads of sweat clung across Ivy’s forehead making her fringe damp. The heat didn’t agree with Ivy. Small and dark, with her blunt black bob she reminded Bea of a modern-day Cleopatra. There the resemblance ended, though, for Bea knew Ivy missed the cold crisp days of Gosport on the south coast of England. But, like the other artists in Blackie’s show, plus his assistant, Jo, who was Rainey’s mother, wardrobe assistant and the girls’ chaperone all rolled into one, they were there to entertain the brave boys who were fighting the war against Hitler. For this, the Bluebirds and other cast members were each paid the princely sum of ten pounds a week.

‘Not sure yet,’ Bea answered, then opened the battered leather music case that was her job to take care of.

‘Side of the truck, Ivy,’ called Blackie who must have heard her shout to Bea. ‘Follow Rainey, a tarpaulin’s being set up.’

Blackie Wilson was helping steer the scratched upright piano on its way down from a lorry before it careered off the two wooden planks and swerved to its final demise in the sand. Bea saw the canvas shelter that had now been erected to give the players privacy and relief from the gritty sand that swirled in the light wind and ferocious heat.

Now Bea continued checking the music sheets were in the order Blackie would play them throughout the show. The piano was his prop and when the performance was ready to start he would remove his uniform of khaki shorts and matching shirt and slip into his black dinner suit.

‘All right?’ Blackie enquired. He looked tanned and fit, and his dark curls were tinted almost to gold at the front where the fierce sun had caught him. Bea was struck anew by how his odd-coloured eyes, one blue, one brown, only enhanced his good looks. Ghost eyes some people called them – lucky, others said.

Bea said, ‘I could kill for a cuppa.’ She was hungry and tired as well.

The word ‘kill’ made her suddenly remember the makeshift graves they’d driven past in the dunes. Sticks with helmets on top, stuck above the mounds to mark where fighting men had died, and been buried.

‘Tea’ll be ready in a minute,’ Blackie said. ‘We’ll eat properly after the show. The army has prepared food and a tent for us to sleep in and rigged up private showers . . .’

‘The lack of water is something I never thought about before coming out here,’ Bea said to him. She knew now it was rationed for everyone. ‘I’ll get ready.’ She turned to walk away.

‘Bea!’ Blackie called and she turned. ‘I’ve already been asked by one of the Forces’ spokesmen here if you’ll sing “Always In My Heart”?’

‘I will if it’s all right with Rainey and Ivy.’

‘’Course it is,’ he said. She worried, she had more and more requests to sing that brand new song. Of course, she was flattered to be asked to sing solo but she didn’t want her friends to get upset about it.

It had all started when the Bluebirds had had to improvise and pad out the show because half the concert party had gone down with a stomach upset. Surprisingly, Ivy told a few jokes! Rainey and Bea had heard them before. They were old chestnuts they’d heard Bert come out with in the café. The men had loved her! But Ivy said she was relieved when the outbreak of sickness had passed and the cast was on its feet again and she could get back to singing.

‘You’re here to make the men happy,’ Blackie stressed. ‘No one’s ever thought it strange that Ivy with her sultry Billie Holiday voice sings alone.’

Bea smiled. ‘You’re right. You play and I’ll follow,’ she said as she went in the direction of the makeshift tent where the actors were changing. The smell of sweat, fresh and stale, greeted her as she pulled back a corner flap.

Selma the snake woman had propped up a small mirror and was trying to glue her fake eyelashes in place. She looked over to Bea, shrugged and said, ‘I think these look more like dead spiders every day. What d’you think, love?’

‘You can work wonders with them, Sel, you always do.’

Make-up was almost non-existent now. War shortages had taken care of that. Already Selma was zipped into her shiny green outfit that Bea decided made her look more snake-like than the real thing. Soon the contortionist would keep the audience’s eyes glued on her as she curled herself fluidly into shapes that Bea thought impossible for any human body to attempt.

A sharp exchange of voices took her attention away from Selma.

‘I saw you!’

‘Have it your own way, then, I did stare at her!’

Bea’s heart dropped like a stone. The Dancing Duo were at it again! She couldn’t see Leonora or Len. They were behind the rails of costumes brought down from the trucks. The couple’s bickering was gaining momentum as if their lives depended on it. They probably did, Bea thought. Leonora’s jealousy was legendary. Len only had to glance at a woman and his middle-aged wife insisted he wanted her as a fancy piece. A few days ago Leonora had apparently caught him chatting to Old Olive, who was really a gorgeous-looking brunette aged twenty-five, and she obviously wasn’t letting that matter rest. Blackie had long since given up warning the Dancing Duo if they didn’t desist in upsetting the rest of the crew, they’d be sent home in disgrace. Alas, their rows often fluctuated into full-blown throwing sessions but always ended in weepy recriminations and apologies. Golly, could they dance though, thought Bea, and the audiences loved the glamour of their act.

Leonora’s frocks were dreams of tulle, lace and sequins that she guarded with her life. She insisted on changing halfway through their act, coming back on stage in another cloud of a dress while Len finished a solo tap dance. The frocks she wore were now impossible to buy. Even if she had coupons, the materials just weren’t available. The audience was transfixed by the dancing couple’s film-star qualities. Perhaps they conjured the glamour and memories of times past.

Leonora was now tying Len’s black bow tie, the argument seemingly forgotten or, more likely, put on hold. Bea smiled. Len might once have been a Lothario but it was rumoured he now preferred the bottle to blondes. Still, jealous Leonora couldn’t help the way she felt about her man, could she?

‘Can you zip me up?’ Rainey moved in front of Bea, who sealed her friend’s slim body into the stage dress. Earlier in their careers the girls had started their act wearing Air Force uniforms, then left the stage to change into the glamorous creations provided by Madame Nellie Walker, Blackie’s mentor. When they were in India, Bea had suggested their audiences had had enough of drab uniforms and deserved as much glamour as the girls could provide. Rainey turned and smiled at her.

‘Thanks,’ she said. Bea noticed her pallor. ‘You all right?’

‘Of course!’ Rainey’s voice was sharp.

Bea put Rainey’s tetchiness down to her missing Charlie.

Her thoughts were disturbed by Jo, who thrust a make-up bag and hand-mirror in front of her. ‘Come on, get ready.’

A tiny gold camel glinted from the collection of charms hanging from the chain on Jo’s slender wrist.

‘Is that new?’

Jo blushed and then smiled. Blackie had declared his love for Jo before they’d left England. After presenting her with the bracelet, he’d promised to buy her a charm for every country they visited. So far, he’d managed to do just that, even though Bea knew he’d had to pay extortionate prices for some of them. Jo held out her hand to display a miniature temple from Burma, a heart from England, a pyramid from Egypt and a tiny gold thistle from Scotland next to India’s tiger. She shook the bracelet and the gold jangled. Bea put her arms around Jo. ‘I’m glad you and Blackie have an understanding,’ she said. ‘He’s lucky to have you.’

Jo pulled away from Bea, ‘I’m the lucky one,’ she said. ‘Because of Blackie, I’ve travelled to places I never thought possible and I so love being with you all.’ She paused and smoothed her fair hair back behind her ears. ‘But to tell the truth, I can’t wait to get back to England, to Gosport. I bet you miss your brother and little Gracie.’

Eddie, Bea’s brother, had recently become a father to Gracie, the result of a one night-stand. Sunshine, Gracie’s mother, had died giving birth.

‘Gracie’s rolling over now and sitting up,’ Bea smiled.

‘I know, your mum is daft about that baby. Maud tells me all about her in her letters. I miss my best friend.’

‘Yes, I miss Mum. In the last letter I had from Eddie he was telling me that Grandad Solomon was again taken to a séance given by that Helen Duncan, the spiritualist. Gertie took him to Portsmouth . . .’

‘That Gertie’s always carting him off to places like that,’ Jo said.

Bea’s grandad Solomon, who lodged in Lavinia House where Gertie also lived, was captivated by the spritely elderly woman whose company seemed to have given the old man a new lease of life.

‘Didn’t that Helen Duncan tell everyone about HMS Barham long before it became common knowledge?’

‘That’s the woman, Jo. Gertie says she’s ever so good. She informed people that the ship was sunk ages before it was announced to the public last January.’

‘I don’t really know much about it,’ Jo said.

‘Well, we’re on tour and we don’t get to hear much about what’s going on back home. I wish I could go to Helen Duncan and ask her what’s in store for me,’ said Bea.

‘Maybe you wouldn’t like it if you did,’ said Jo, stepping aside as a large man tried to push his way into the tent.

‘I can’t find my bleedin’ shoes!’ The top-hatted, ­bulbous-nosed comic’s voice was loud. He had pulled back the sheeting and was staring glassy-eyed inside the tented area. A waft of spirits came from him and mingled with the stale sweat from his very grubby checked suit.

‘Probably still in the back of the lorry,’ Jo said. ‘No rude jokes tonight, Titch, you know the rules.’

There was a long list of forbidden material the players were advised not to use, and Blackie could be called upon to produce this rule book at any time. Lewd jokes and offensive acts were frowned upon by Basil Dean, the man responsible for ENSA. The comic swore and withdrew.

Jo shook her head. Bea wrinkled her nose; she disliked Tiny Titch, the comic, as well. He danced wearing enormous long shoes and his act could be very funny. The audience loved him but like most comics he was a solitary and morose man when off the stage.

‘A lorry-load of the British Eighth army has just arrived,’ Ivy shouted from where she’d been watching the proceedings from behind a tear in the canvas sheeting. She let the tarpaulin fall again. Bea could hear raised male voices.

‘I wonder how many . . .’ Jo began.

‘Doesn’t matter,’ said Bea, ‘the more the merrier. They all deserve a bit of cheering up for all they’re doing for England, don’t they?’

‘I forgot to ask, Ivy, did you get a letter from Eddie?’ shouted Jo. ‘I must write back to Syd Kennedy as well.’ Syd was a friend of Jo’s who owned a garage in Alverstoke.

Ivy reappeared. ‘I did. And I’ve got a letter to go back to him this time.’ Then she was gone again.

Bea shrugged. It was good that letters from home were forwarded on to the various tour stops. Not that she received many. Her mum occasionally wrote, and sometimes she received a few words from her brother, Eddie. Bea was happy that Eddie and Ivy were on an even keel again after the shock of the unexpected baby. Ivy had had feelings for Eddie since her schooldays. Bea was sure Eddie reciprocated but had kept his feelings hidden from Ivy until recently; mainly because she was around seven years younger than him. Now they were both older, though, the age difference didn’t seem to matter.

Gracie’s birth had opened a chasm between them but slowly it was narrowing. How could it not when Gracie had melted Ivy’s heart? Bea remembered how Gracie charmed everyone.

Eddie had been heartbroken when he’d been turned down for active service on medical grounds. However, because of the war his building firm was thriving; repairing and renovating bomb-damaged houses and premises was big business.

‘Fifteen minutes,’ announced Blackie, pulling back the tarpaulin and stepping inside with a tin tray filled with steaming enamelled mugs.

‘You’re a life-saver,’ said Bea, helping herself, her smile a mile wide. ‘Come and get it,’ she called, so he could dole out the tea to the rest of the thirsty actors who were in various stages of undress.

‘There’s about five hundred men out there now,’ said Blackie, ‘and they’re still turning up, ferried in on all modes of transport.’ Bea saw the wink he gave Jo. He’d changed now into his suit, his dark curls just touching his collar. Maybe she’d tell him later she thought he needed a haircut!

There was a sudden burst of far-off gunfire. The occupants of the tent became hushed, the atmosphere tense.

‘Don’t worry about that,’ Blackie shouted. ‘Those machine guns are in the distance and most of the lads here are carrying rifles.’

‘Is that little speech supposed to make everyone feel better?’ Bea asked.

Blackie glared at her but didn’t reply.

Olive was now at Blackie’s side. She was swamped by a ragged dress and wore scuffed, high-buttoned boots. Her ill-fitting apron was deliberately grubby. The black straw hat with a rose that threatened to fall from its brim was pushed forward over one eye. She’d used dark make-up to give the appearance of eye bags and wrinkles. Looking like an old crone, she carried a paint-speckled birdcage with a large stuffed bird hanging upside down from its perch. Bea gave her a big smile. ‘Want a cuppa?’

Olive nodded. ‘I’m fair parched,’ she said, setting down the birdcage and taking a mug from the tray.

Olive opened the show. Her repertoire of comic songs soon had the men laughing. She began with ‘The Biggest Aspidistra in The World’. Then with knowing winks and suggestive body movements she told the story of ‘My Old Man’. After that came ‘Everything Stops for Tea’. Bea was always surprised that the men showed how much they appreciated that song. She supposed it was because there was something very English about cups of tea. ‘It’s a Bit of a Ruin That Cromwell Knocked About A Bit’ came next. Olive kept the best until last when she had the audience wiping tears of laughter from their eyes with the Marie Lloyd song, ‘I Sits Amongst The Cabbages and Peas’. Olive always received thunderous applause and she deserved every handclap, thought Bea, for the way she handled the suggestive but innocent song.

‘I’ll get by the side of the stage behind the curtain,’ Olive said to Blackie, replacing the tin mug on the tray. Blackie handed the tray of remaining teas and empty mugs to Jo with a grin and followed Olive, saying, ‘You can’t start without me.’ He then called louder, ‘Fifteen minutes, everyone.’

Bea loved watching Olive who had a naturally suggestive way of signalling words so that every man in the audience felt she was singing just for him. Bea worked hard at her own . . .