I was almost home when the air raid siren sounded. My first instinct was to race the last few streets back to the house but I stopped on the corner, irresolute. The Tube station was just over the road and I knew that people had taken to sheltering on the platforms during air raids, despite the protests of the station master.
If I went home, I could potentially be spending the night in the Anderson shelter with Mr and Mrs Cartwright. The thought of being stuck in that tiny space with Mr Cartwright's eyes all over me was enough to decide me.
I crossed over the road and descended the steps into the Tube station. Many more people had the same idea and the station master stood by silently as people flowed onto the platforms. The last Tube had left a few moments before and the platforms were still largely empty.
I picked the southbound platform and made my way right to the very end, to the mouth of the tunnel where the platform was at its narrowest.
I looked enviously at the people who had come prepared with rugs, flasks and newspapers. I stood and leaned against the tiled wall. My legs were already tired from running up and down the stairs of the office all day and it wasn't long before I overcame my distaste and sat down on the floor, with my back against the wall. My stretched-out legs just reached the lip of the platform.
More people had come in and already there was the smell of confined humanity. Anxious chatter was punctuated by occasional laughter as people tried to make light of the situation.
The first dull thumps of bombs falling sounded a few moments later and the laughter died down. I tried not to think about where they were falling, tried not to call to mind the bombed-out houses and streets I walked past every day, the wardens picking through piles of rubble, unidentifiable things being brought out covered with sheets.
I shivered and pulled my coat tighter about me. I was dimly aware of other people moving down towards my end of the platform, settling themselves nearby.
I wished I had brought a newspaper or book to read, something to distract me from my gloomy thoughts. My life had once seemed a dazzling thing, full of promise and possibility. I had arrived in London like every other suburban girl before me, excited by the possibilities, the chance to remake myself into a new person, far away from the stuffy conventions of home. In London, with its blessing of anonymity, I could explore the desires and promptings of my heart that had always been so carefully concealed.
Even when the war had come, it had not caused me any alarm. Here was another opportunity, the chance to do a different sort of work that would never have been open to me before. I had moved from bank clerk to a clerk in the War Office, taking minutes from meetings where every aspect of the war was discussed.
It was exciting, at first. But as the bombings intensified, everything that had been delightful about life gradually ebbed away. The girls I had lived with in a messy, joyously chaotic flat in Clapham had all moved away; gone to join the Land Army or the ATS or to move back with their parents in the country. I had taken a room with the Cartwrights because it was convenient for work and because they had an air raid shelter in the garden. But there were no more parties, no more evenings in the pub.
I closed my eyes and wondered if I might be able to sleep until the raid was over.
A terrific bang sounded somewhere very close by. The whole station trembled and shuddered and then the lights went out, plunging us all into complete darkness. Screams sounded all around me and I could hear people moving, getting to their feet. I sat frozen in terror, unable to see anything at all in the blackness. Was this what death was like? A sudden snuffing out of the lights?
And then the voice of the station master; perhaps a notch higher than normal but still managing to sound calm, cutting through the tide of panic.
"Remain calm, ladies and gents! That was a big one all right but it hasn't hit us. The lights might be out for a while I'm afraid so the best thing is to remain where you are. As soon as all the all-clear sounds, we'll get the torches and get you out of here."
The panicked voices subsided to anxious murmurings. A few people struck matches and tiny pin pricks of light flared briefly down the length of the platform, like stars in the night sky.
I took deep breaths to try and still the hammering of my heart. I raised my hand before my face but could see nothing at all. The hot, sweaty stink of the station suddenly seemed more potent now we were in darkness. I closed my eyes and tried to focus only on my breathing.
I gradually became aware of a noise not too far from me. A soft sobbing noise of somebody crying. I shuffled along towards the noise, keeping my back to the wall. It would be absurd to break my neck now by falling onto the tracks.
The sound of the crying became more distinct. It was definitely a woman sobbing.
I reached out a hand and touched some heavy, thick material that felt like tweed. There was an immediate cry of alarm and I felt her flinch away from me.
"Sorry," I said. "Sorry! I forgot you can't see me. I just wanted to see if you were all right."
"Yes," came a voice, choked with tears. "Yes, perfectly all right, thank you."
"It was a bit of a shock, wasn't it? And this total darkness...it's unnatural. Even in the darkest night you can always see something at least."
"Yes. It's...it's so dark."
"But it does have some advantages," I said, trying to sound perky. "It means you can't see that I didn't comb my hair very well this morning."
There was a polite attempt at a laugh that then descended into sobbing. I reached out and felt the tweed again. I squeezed what I took to be the arm beneath it.
"Come on now. We're quite safe down here."
"It's not me I'm worried about. I'm worried for my little boy."
"Where is he?"
"Out in Essex with my mum."
"Then he's a lot better off than we are."
"But he won't be if I die down here!"
"We're not going to die. We're going to sit here in the dark for a while, get very smelly and then, when the all clear goes, we'll be back up top."
There was a lot of sniffing and gasping but after a few moments, it sounded as if her breathing was steadying.
"I know I'm better off down here that I would be in my digs," I said. "They've got a shelter in the garden but..."
"But what?"
Something about the total darkness seemed to invite confidences.
"Well, it's the man of the house you see. He...has a way of looking at me that I don't much care for."
"I know exactly what you mean, darlin'," came the response. No tears in the voice this time. "Their eyes is everywhere they oughtn't to be. Stares at your chest, does he?"
"Actually no. I don't have much of a chest to speak of. It's my legs he stares at."
"Dirty old bugger." And that made me laugh and then I heard her laughing as well and some of the tension seemed to lift. "Got a good pair of pins, have you?"
