The next day Josie hesitated to volunteer to cook the sausages, but Kathleen sent out the challenge. “So what do you reckon you can do with a few sausages, then?”

  “My husband always liked my toad-in-the-hole,” Josie said. “I think we can make that with powdered egg and not waste a real one.”

  “And how do you make that?” Kathleen demanded.

  “You’ve never eaten toad-in-the-hole?” Josie was incredulous.

  “I told you. Sausages are not an item suitable for the upper classes. That’s the message given in this house. And at home we had black pudding, but I hardly remember sausages.”

  “It’s quite tasty,” Josie said and made the batter.

  “Go on. I dare you to serve some of this to Miss Harcourt and see what she says,” Kathleen said, grinning with anticipation.

  “All right. I will.” Josie went through to the sitting room, where Miss Harcourt was listening to the wireless.

  “Sorry to interrupt you, missus,” she said, “but I am about to serve our supper, and I wondered if you wanted to try some.”

  “What is it?” Miss Harcourt turned down the voice on the radio.

  “It’s toad-in-the-hole, missus.”

  “We are reduced to eating amphibians now, are we? No thank you.”

  “It’s not a real toad. That’s just its name. It’s sausages in a Yorkshire pudding.”

  “That sounds equally bad.”

  “Suit yourself,” Josie said. “We’ll go ahead with our supper, then, and bring you your ham later.” She headed for the door.

  “Perhaps I could just try it,” Miss Harcourt called after her.

  “I’ll bring you some in the dining room if you like.”

  “You are most kind,” Miss Harcourt replied.

  Josie allowed herself a little smile as she went back to the kitchen.

  The meal was at least a partial success. Miss Harcourt described it as “interesting” and “not bad at all.” Josie suspected she didn’t want to admit she had been wrong about sausages, but she also realized that sausages were not what they used to be. Now there was very little meat to a lot of rusk filler, but she still enjoyed her dish anyway. So did Kathleen, who chomped it down greedily. Josie could see Kathleen was warming to the idea of Josie taking over some of the cooking.

  When she was getting undressed that night, an exercise that usually took a considerable time and was painful, she noticed that she didn’t wince as her arm came out of the sleeve of her jumper. She moved it tentatively. It was stiff and sore, but it only produced minor discomfort. Her collarbone was healing. This created conflicting emotions: she’d welcome the use of two arms again, but as soon as Miss Harcourt and Kathleen saw she was healed, they would want her gone—unless her cooking had given her an excuse to stay. Josie wasn’t sure herself whether she wanted to be placed somewhere else. Her situation wasn’t the most comfortable, to be sure, but at least she had a warm kitchen to sit in when Kathleen went off to her own quarters after supper and an endless supply of books to read. She even dared to break Miss Harcourt’s rule and read in the kitchen, making sure the book was not put down on any surface except her own knees. And she had to admit that she rather wanted to see Mike again. It was stupid, she knew, but it was heady, too. He was just being kind, she told herself firmly. But kindness had been in short supply in her life until now.

  CHAPTER 13

  Josie was anxious to see the girls at Alf Badger’s cottage, but she didn’t want to intrude while they were getting settled in. She gave them a week and had made up her mind to go the next day, if the weather allowed, when Lottie appeared at the front door.

  “You’ve got a visitor,” Kathleen said, giving Josie an accusatory look.

  Josie heart leapt, thinking it would be Mike Johnson. But instead the schoolgirl stood there, looking apprehensive.

  “Hello, Lottie, love,” Josie said. “You look frozen to the marrow. Come on in and have a cup of tea.”

  She led Lottie through to the kitchen. Lottie looked around her, worried now. “Oh, should I have come to the back door? I’m sorry. I didn’t realize.”

  “It’s all right. No harm done. Take your coat off and sit down,” Josie said. She turned to Kathleen. “This is Lottie. She’s billeted with the Badgers in the village.”

  “I am pleased to meet you,” Lottie said.

  Kathleen’s expression changed. “You’re foreign?”

  “I’m German,” Lottie said. “I am also Jewish.”

  “Her parents put her on a train and sent her away before the war started,” Josie explained. “She was with people in London who didn’t treat her well. I hope the Badgers are better?”

  “Oh yes.” Lottie smiled. “They are very kind. Mrs Badger says she must feed me up because I am too thin. They have good food, too. Eggs from their chickens, and they keep a pig and grow vegetables. Mrs Badger is a very good cook.”

  “I’m glad,” Josie said. “And what’s it like in the attic? Freezing cold?”

  “It’s not bad,” Lottie said. “They have made me a space over the kitchen, so the warmth comes up. The other girls offered to let me share their room. Dorothy wants to share a bed with Sheila anyway. She’s afraid to sleep on her own. So there would be a spare bed, but I feel that I need a private space, especially when I have to do my homework.”

  “So they’ve got you into a school, then?”

  Again Lottie smiled. “Yes. The lady who brought us here came and arranged for us to attend schools. The other two go to the primary school in the next village, but I am attending the grammar school in Spalding. It’s quite a long way on the bus, but it seems like a good school.”

  “So you’re going to be happy there?”

  Lottie shrugged. “I hope so. It is always the same. The girls hear my accent, and when they find out I am German, they are suspicious of me. But I hope to make friends and to show my teachers what I can do.”

  “Good for you.”

  Lottie looked up shyly. “I came to ask you a favour, Mrs Banks. I met a man . . .”

  “What?” Josie’s voice was sharp. “You’re too young for that sort of thing.”

  “No, nothing like that,” Lottie said hastily. “He is a very nice man. A man of good repute. He is a doctor—an eye doctor at the hospital in Peterborough. My first day at school, I did not know where the bus stop was, so I missed the bus coming home. I didn’t know what to do. It is a long way, as I told you, but I had to walk. I started off. He saw me walking and stopped to give me a lift. He is also German, and he has invited me to tea on Saturday.” She hesitated. “I wondered if you would come with me, Mrs Banks. I do not think it would be right for me to go to a man’s house alone.”

  “Who is this man?” Kathleen asked. “He lives around here?”

  “His name is Dr Goldsmith,” Lottie said.

  “Oh, him.” Kathleen nodded. “Yes, we know him. He bought that big house on the other side of the village. Out on the marsh.”

  “How do we get there?” Josie asked. “Is it too far to walk?”

  “Dr Goldsmith says he will send his motor car for me on Saturday at three o’clock. So if you can meet me at Mrs Badger’s house before then . . .”

  “Of course I can,” Josie said. “Although I shall feel like a gooseberry.”

  “What? Why should you feel like a fruit?”

  Josie laughed. “That’s another silly English expression. If we feel like the odd person out, we say we feel like a gooseberry. You will want to speak your language to a fellow countryman, so I won’t be able to join in.”

  “Oh no. That would be rude,” Lottie said. “We shall speak English.”

  As soon as they had gone, Kathleen stared at Josie, frowning. “What’s this place doing, crawling with Germans, then?” she said.

  “They are Jewish, Lottie. They escaped from Germany, where they were being persecuted.”

  “That’s what they all say,” Kathleen muttered. “Still, it’s up to you who you mix with. You won’t be here long.”

  “You still want me to go?” Josie said. “Even if I help with the cooking for you? And the other chores?”

  She could see Kathleen struggling with not wanting her in the house but wanting the help Josie could provide. “We’ll have to see what the mistress says,” she said at last.

  On Saturday Josie tried to make herself look respectable with her mismatched items of clothing. She had a choice between a dark-green wool skirt and a red-and-blue faded tartan. Nothing really went with the red and blue, so it had to be the dark-green skirt, to which she added a beige jumper and then Miss Harcourt’s long, mannish cardigan over it. Not in any way fashionable but at least respectable. She added her necklace of imitation pearls, which softened the appearance a little. She looked at her face and wished for make-up. She had been supplied with necessities—comb, toothbrush, face flannel, but no rouge or powder or lipstick. No clips to hold back her hair. She resolved to buy some of these things when she went into the nearest town with Mike Johnson—if he remembered his offer to drive her into town, that is. She paused, thinking about this. If he had safely returned from his bombing mission.

  She had started counting the planes going out in the evening, wondering which one was his, and then the numbers returning. But after two flights had returned with missing aircraft, she stopped doing it. No sense in getting upset about something she couldn’t control.

  She slipped her new galoshes over her own shoes, put on her coat and scarf and had just opened the front door when Miss Harcourt appeared in the foyer.

  “Where are you off to, then?” The way she phrased any question always made it sound like an inquisition.

  “I’m taking the young girl who was evacuated with me to have tea with a local doctor,” she said.

  “Really? Dr Hammond? He doesn’t seem like the type to ask people to tea.”

  “No, this man is originally German. German Jewish, that is. Now he’s a doctor at a hospital.”

  “Oh, that one.” Miss Harcourt’s expression was cold. “Yes, we heard about him when he moved in right before the war. We found the timing suspicious. I don’t know why he’d want to ask you to tea.”

  “It’s the little girl he’s invited, because she’s also a German Jew.”

  “Gracious. The community is being invaded with them, then.” Miss Harcourt sniffed. “Isn’t it rather suspicious that so many Germans happen to take up residence beside a major RAF station? Those Germans will stop at nothing, you know. They parachute in spies disguised as nuns. I’d be very careful if I were you.”

  “Don’t worry, I won’t divulge any of the state secrets that Mr Churchill shared with me yesterday,” Josie said.

  Miss Harcourt sighed. “I knew it was a bad idea to open my home to a stranger from London. First it’s cavorting with airmen and then bringing Germans into my house. Still, that shoulder of yours should be healing quite soon, should it not? And then you’ll be off.”

  With that encouraging message, Josie went to meet Lottie. The snow had started to melt, and it was now wet and muddy underfoot, but the galoshes did their work, and her feet remained dry. From Miss Harcourt’s attitude, it seemed that any plan to stay on and help with the cooking was not going to be acceptable, however useful Josie might be.

  Lottie was standing by the street at the end of the Badgers’ path. She waved as Josie approached. Josie noticed her face had lost that pallid, pinched look already, and her smile was hopeful.

  “Hello, love,” Josie said. “Been waiting long?”

  “A little while,” Lottie said. “I didn’t want to miss Dr Goldsmith.”

  As she finished speaking, a sleek maroon Aston Martin motor car approached, reversed in the gravel area in front of the pub, then came to a halt in front of them. The driver got out—a tall, slim man with receding fair hair and heavy rimmed spectacles. His face had a worried expression, but when he smiled, he suddenly looked much younger.

  “Ah, here you are. I hope you do not wait too long in the cold.”

  “No, we just got here,” Lottie said. “And Doctor, this is Mrs Banks. I asked her to come with me.”

  “Quite right,” he said. He extended his hand to Josie. “I am Dr Goldsmith. How do you do.” He gave a little nodding bow.

  “I’d shake hands if I could,” Josie said and opened her coat to reveal the sling.

  “Ah, you have an injury,” he said. “Here, let me assist you into my car.”

  He helped her in and then opened the back door for Lottie. They set off, out of the village and across a marshy area, dotted with water-filled dykes.

  “So, Mrs Banks,” the man began tentatively, “you are a resident of this village? I don’t believe I have seen you before.”

  “Oh no, I arrived with Lottie,” Josie said. “Evacuated from London like her. My house was destroyed by a bomb, you see.”

  “I am very sorry for this,” he said. “So much needless suffering.”

  Josie nodded, unsure how to respond to that. Half a mile out of the village, they came to a house beside the road. It was another Georgian house, square, built of brick, but it stood in splendid, lonely isolation.

  “Here we are,” the doctor said. He pulled into the driveway, then opened the doors for his guests, leading them into a front hall, where he took their coats, then into a warm sitting room with a blazing fire. It was about the same size as Miss Harcourt’s sitting room but had a more comfortable, lived-in feel to it. Two large leather armchairs were on either side of the fire. A sofa faced the hearth, and on the low table in front of it was a tray containing teacups, sugar and milk, plus a cake stand with small cakes and biscuits on it.

  “Do sit down,” he said. “I will make the tea.”

  They sat on the sofa. Josie noticed Lottie looking longingly at the cakes on the stand.

  Dr Goldsmith reappeared with a teapot under a cosy and poured the tea. “Please,” he said. “Help yourself to a cake.”

  “Do you have a cook?” Josie asked him. “Or did you bake these yourself?”

  “Ach, no.” He laughed. “I am no baker. I can manage to boil an egg. I only have a cleaning woman who comes in twice a week. Otherwise, I am alone here. These cakes are gifts from a patient. I operated on her cataracts, and she owns a bakery. Good timing, yes?”

  His English was clipped upper class with just a trace of accent. He offered the cakes, and they both took one.

  “So how long have you been in England, then?” Josie asked. “Your English is very good.”

  He smiled. “I came over here after the last war. In 1919. I was a prisoner of war, and I decided never to return to Germany.”

  “You were in the army, then?”

  “I was in my last year of medical school in Tübingen when they came for us. The army, you know. All final-year students were required to serve as army doctors on the front. I cannot describe what that was like. I still have bad dreams about it. Men dying in mud and filth, torn apart on barbed wire. It was the same for both sides. A living hell. Such a stupid, meaningless war directed by old men who knew only about cavalry charges. But in England, as a prisoner, I was treated with respect. I made up my mind that I wanted to stay in a place that did not glorify war. When I was released, I finished my medical training at St Thomas’s Hospital and have practiced as a doctor ever since.”

  “But why come out here, to the middle of nowhere?” Josie looked out of the window at the endless flat expanse.

  He sighed. “I was working as an eye surgeon in Birmingham. I liked my job. I was content. Suddenly everyone was suspicious. My neighbours did not wish to talk to me. There was talk of my being taken to an internment camp as an enemy alien, even though I told them I was a Jew. So I decided to lie low. Besides, I like the feel of this countryside. It is remote but beautiful. I have been writing poetry since the Great War. I have published two volumes, and now I think I may wish to write a novel. This is the perfect place, no?” He looked at Lottie and smiled. “Do not be shy. Is the cake good?”

  Lottie nodded, her mouth full of crumbs. “Very good,” she said.

  “You must miss your home,” Dr Goldsmith said. “And the food?”

  Lottie smiled then. “I miss my mother’s cooking. The Knödel. The Spätzle and Leberkäse.”

  “Ah, Spätzle!” He gave a little sigh. “Ich hatte fast vergessen.”

  And they lapsed into German before he corrected himself. “I am sorry. It is rude to speak in a language someone else does not understand. I am afraid it was the memory of food that took us both back home.”

  “Do you have family you left behind?” Josie asked.

  “I did have,” he said. “I am afraid they have been rounded up with other Jews. My father kept a jewellery shop. It was smashed and everything taken. That was the last I heard, two years ago now.”

  “But you didn’t marry?” Josie asked, feeling awkward as soon as she said the words. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t be questioning you like this.”

  He shrugged. “I had a sweetheart when I was a student in Germany,” he said. “After the war I found she had married someone else. Someone who had stayed home because his father had connections. And here . . . at first I was too occupied finishing my training and establishing my career. Then I wanted to find a nice Jewish girl, to please my parents. But nice Jewish girls are hard to find in England. And then . . . then it all seemed a bit late. And I am used to my own company.” He put down his teacup. “But you are married? Your husband is in the army? The air force?”

  “The army,” Josie said. “And abroad somewhere. He’s not allowed to say where. They censor the letters.”

  “How sad. How you must miss him.”

  Josie decided not to answer this truthfully. “It’s the same for everyone,” she said. “We all have to do our part, don’t we?”

  “You are a brave woman,” he said, and turned to Lottie, asking her about her family.