‘I – I don’t think I’ll come,’ Kate faltered. Most of the girls not on duty were going to the dance in Lincoln, but Kate wasn’t in the mood. She’d had no reply from Danny to her last two letters and was just beginning to feel a little uneasy about his safety.

Mavis, hands on hips, came and stood over her. ‘Oh yes, you are, my girl, so you’d better look slippy and get ready.’

Adopting that stance, Mavis reminded Kate so sharply of her mother that she burst into laughter. ‘Oh, all right then. I’ll come.’

She levered herself off the bed, gathered her things together to get washed, put on a clean shirt and brush her uniform.

Mavis had not moved away but was still hovering near Kate’s bed. ‘I hope you’re not going to bawl me out,’ she said, chewing the side of her thumb.

‘Now what have you done?’ Kate said in mild exasperation.

‘I’ve fixed the three of us up with Dave and a couple of his mates.’

‘Oh, I’ll take Dave, then,’ Isobel said airily.

‘Keep off, Cartwright. He’s mine, and you too, Kate Hilton, with those green eyes of yours.’

‘Sounds like you’ve got the “green eye” over him yourself,’ Isobel drawled, and Kate said, ‘Oh, I get it! We get the pimply friends, do we? I’d sooner go with Sandy.’

‘Eh?’

‘You know, the navigator in T-Tommy.’

‘Oh yes, I know him. Sorry – he’s on leave, evidently.’

Kate pulled a face. ‘On second thoughts, then, I reckon I will give it a miss . . .’

‘Oh no you won’t, when I’ve spent the last couple of days running round like a headless chicken fixing it all up.’

‘Nobody asked you to,’ Isobel put in tartly, but Mavis ignored her.

‘There’s the three of them,’ she went on. ‘My Dave, Johnny and Brian. Johnny’s a bit of a lad, but Iso will handle him. And Brian’s nice. Besides, he’s – er – married.’

‘I see – I get lumbered with the nice safe ones, do I?’ Kate pretended huffiness.

‘Well, to be honest,’ Mavis wriggled her shoulders with embarrassment, not realizing, for once, that Kate was teasing her, ‘the way you talk – I thought you’d want it that way. I mean—’ she was floundering now. ‘The way you talk about this Danny, I thought he was your boyfriend – someone special.’

‘He’s very special,’ Kate said softly, ‘but he’s not my boyfriend.’

Mavis looked puzzled. ‘Oh. Then . . .?’

‘That’s enough questions for one night,’ Kate laughed, and linking arms, the friends ducked out into the night to dash across to the ablutions through the drizzle.