Chapter 28

13 September 1942

‘You look serious,' Tony said, making Peggy jump. She hadn't heard him knock or enter her office and now he was standing on the other side of her desk smiling sympathetically at her.

She tapped her fountain pen against the edict on her desk that she had just translated and was now typing up.

‘What's worrying you?'

She rubbed her tired eyes and groaned. ‘Apart from Helen, you mean?'

‘Have you seen much of her since her aunt passed away? How is she coping without her?'

Peggy shook her head sadly. ‘Not as much as I would have liked. I've usually left for work by the time she brings Bobby round for Mum to babysit. I do pop round most afternoons, but although she's always polite, the spark has gone out of her. I can tell she's still struggling to come to terms with her loss. It's been months now, and I worry that she's so withdrawn, but at least she's back at work.'

Tony pushed his hands into his pockets and looked slightly awkward for a moment. ‘I hate to ask, but I don't suppose she's reported back about hearing any further information at work we might find useful?'

Peggy shook her head. ‘No, unfortunately not.' A chilling thought occurred to her. ‘I hope she doesn't get despondent about that and start taking unnecessary risks.' She pictured Bobby and felt slightly reassured. ‘Hopefully, with Bobby to care for, she won't be tempted to.'

‘I hope not. We must not do anything to draw attention to ourselves and neither should she.'

‘We definitely don't want that happening,' she said, terrified of being arrested by the German Secret Field Police.

‘If you're worrying about the Geheime Feldpolizei,' Tony asked, as if reading her thoughts, and giving them their German name, ‘Then don't. The GFP have more than enough on their hands right now worrying about people helping escaped enforced workers. They won't focus much on anything we're doing.'

Peggy glanced at the closed office door, thinking about the many rumours she had heard about prisoners being taken to a house in Havre des Pas called Silvertide. She felt sick at the thought of being interrogated. ‘I hope not. I'm not sure how brave I'd be if I was arrested.'

He leant against her desk and gave her a reassuring smile. ‘You won't be arrested if I have anything to do with it.'

‘You never did tell me why you ended up in prison,' she said intrigued to know what he had done. ‘Or why you were released.'

He sighed. ‘I think it's better you know as little as possible about what I was doing. As far as why they released me, all I was told is that there wasn't enough evidence against me to prove my involvement.'

‘Thank heavens for that.'

He pointed to the papers on her desk. ‘I presume there's more bad news in that document?'

She nodded. ‘It's an order being announced in the Evening Post either tomorrow or the next day, this time about British subjects being deported to Germany.' She didn't think she had been this angry since her father died. ‘What's worse is that the order has come straight from German headquarters. From Berlin, no less.

He groaned. ‘Probably from Hitler himself, then. That is bad news.'

‘It is.' She thought back to the census that had been taken the previous year and how she had hoped it was just a tactic to frighten everyone when the deportations had been postponed. ‘It looks like this time there'll be no delays. No one is going to ignore an order from him, unfortunately.'

Tony pulled out a chair and sat. ‘This sounds like he's found out about the deportation order that wasn't carried out last year.'

She closed her eyes in frustration. ‘It does. I can't see these deportations not happening now. I suppose we should have known they couldn't be put off for ever.' She slid a piece of paper over to him to see for himself, then, remembering he couldn't read German, translated it for him. ‘It says people have no choice. They must go. It doesn't even take into account people's age or their health.'

‘But why now? I don't understand.'

She looked at his face, seeing her fury mirrored in his eyes. ‘Apparently, it's because the British authorities have interned all the German people in Persia. Some of them have supposedly been caught spying.' She realised she was crying and put her hand into her pocket looking for her handkerchief, but Tony gave her his. ‘Thank you.'

Her thoughts turned to Helen, aware that her friend's grieving would have little effect on Nazi officers determined to carry out orders from their Führer. ‘I must warn Helen.'

Tony's face paled. ‘Yes, and as soon as possible. Unfortunately the Jerries keep meticulous records and she'll be on their lists as not being local.'

The enormity of what this would mean to Helen's life dawned on Peggy and her heart raced, making her slightly breathless. ‘She'll need to go into hiding now. There's nothing else for it as far as I can see.' She decided to speak to her mother about Helen's predicament as soon as she got home.

He rested his hand on hers. ‘Try not to panic.' He cocked his head towards the door. ‘You don't want someone noticing you acting differently, and they will do if they see you upset. We'll come up with a plan,' he said quietly, a determined look on his face.

Peggy took a steadying breath. ‘You're right, I need to calm down,' she agreed, trying to regain her composure. ‘I think my family can sort something out for her. We'll certainly try.'

He didn't seem convinced. ‘Are you sure? If you're caught you'll all face prison.' He hesitated, fixing her with his gaze. ‘Or worse.'

She was past caring. The world was a terrifying and dark place and as much as she didn't like the prospect of putting herself or her beloved mother and sister's lives into jeopardy, Peggy was certain that they could no more live with the knowledge that they had stood by while their neighbour and her dear little boy were deported than she could. ‘It's a chance we'll have to take.'

‘And you're sure your mum and Babs will agree with you?'

Peggy stared into his eyes. ‘What do you think?' Before he had a chance to answer, they heard heavy footsteps coming along the corridor towards her office. Peggy waved for him to leave. ‘You should go.'

Tony leant forward and kissed her. ‘If there's anything I can do to help, promise to let me know.'

‘I will.'

‘Good,' he whispered, ‘and if for any reason your mother is concerned about hiding them, then I'll find somewhere else for them to go. Don't feel you're on your own with this, Peggy. Promise me.'

‘I know you're always there for me.'

He went to the door, then turned, a thoughtful look on his face. ‘Tell me exactly who they're planning to deport this time.'

She reread her translation. ‘People and their families whose permanent residence is not on any of the islands. So any who were on the island when the war broke out, and non-islander English males between the ages of sixteen to seventy.'

‘That sounds like quite a lot of people.'

‘Feldkommandant Knackfuss has instructed that they want at least twelve-hundred people sent away, but I can't see how they can make that happen. Not quickly, anyway.'

‘Neither can I, but we all have enough experience of them to know if that's their orders, then they will do their utmost to make it happen. And soon.'

He was right. Helen had to move as soon as possible. Peggy covered her face with her hands and tried to steady herself. ‘I'd better get this work done,' she said. ‘So I can leave a little early and start putting everything in place for Helen.'

He blew her a kiss. ‘We'll sort this out, somehow, Peggy.'

As Peggy hurried home she thought how, with all that had happened in the past two years, this surely was the lowest point so far for them all. Poor Helen had dealt with far too much already in her life and now this. It was too tragic.

Her mother was walking out of the living room when Peggy arrived home.

‘What's happened?' Ida asked, a look of dread on her tired face.

‘Let me take these things off and I'll join you and Babs in the kitchen.'

Her mother knew her well enough to guess the gravity of whatever was bothering her. ‘I'll go and put the kettle on,' she said from the bottom of the stairs. With one hand on the banister, Peggy called up to her sister. ‘Babs, come down here.'

A few minutes later Peggy had explained to her mother and sister what had happened and her plans for Helen and Bobby and she sat waiting for them to speak.

‘I understand if either of you don't agree with my suggestion.' She didn't want them to feel guilty in any way. ‘Tony knows and has offered to help find somewhere for them if you think it safer for us not to have them here.'

Her mother folded her cardigan over her chest and leant back in her chair looking grim. ‘I'm aware we would be putting ourselves in danger,' she said thoughtfully. ‘But that dear girl has already been through enough. It would be unfair of us not to have them here. At least they know us and it's only next door to number 2, so she might be comforted to be close to where she lived with her aunt.'

‘I agree, Mum,' Babs said. ‘They can't go to be with strangers, it would be too cruel. And it's less frightening for them here.'

Peggy relaxed slightly. ‘I told Tony you'd think the same way as me.'

‘When will you speak to her about it?' her mother asked as she looked at her watch. ‘It's probably best if they have one last night in their home before you break this news to them.'

‘I agree,' Peggy said. ‘We can't do too much this evening now, anyway. I'll go next door on my way to work and break the news to her about the new ruling. At least then she'll have the day to pack a few things and try to come to terms with moving here.'

‘Never mind that,' Babs said. ‘We need to work out where to hide her. There's no point in them coming if we don't have anything prepared.'

She was right. ‘I suppose it wouldn't be safe for them to sleep in one of the bedrooms.'

Their mother stood up. ‘Don't you worry about that. Babs and I will sort something out in the attic, while you go and speak to her. Then the pair of you can help Helen pack up and bring over hers and Bobby's things when it's dark.' She stared past them thoughtfully. ‘She'll need to bring the odd thing of Sylvia's, too, no doubt. We've all heard of empty houses being looted, and although we can keep an eye on the place, there's not much we can do if we don't want to draw attention to ourselves.'

‘Good point, Mum.' Peggy thought through her mother's suggestions. ‘We're going to have to do this secretly in the middle of the night.'

‘What about curfew?' Babs asked, looking frightened. ‘I don't mind hiding them here but I'm really scared about being arrested.'

Peggy didn't look at her sister, worried that she might see the guilt in her eyes. Expecting her mother and sister to hide their neighbours was a lot to ask, and exceptionally dangerous. She pushed the thought aside. Each of them had agreed to commit to the plan and that's what they would do.

‘We're going to have to be extremely careful,' her mother insisted. ‘We can't afford for people to see Helen bringing things here. As it is, the authorities are bound to come looking for her at number 2 and will automatically come here to ask us if we know anything. We don't need people seeing us acting oddly and tipping the Nazis off.'

‘No, we don't,' Peggy agreed. ‘I'll go and speak to her in the morning on my way to work. The announcement won't be in the newspaper yet, so we can give her one more night in her home.'