Determinedly turning her thoughts to more cheerful things, Peggy started to plan for Ruby’s wedding. If Mike couldn’t have the reception at the Officers’ Club, then she, Rosie and the Beach View girls would do it at the Anchor. It would mean lots of baking and sandwich making, and they’d dig out the D-Day bunting from under the stairs. A telephone call to Stan secured promises from him and April to help with the food stamps, and although it would be the most terrible rush, Peggy was determined to do Ruby proud.

With that happy thought, Peggy dampened down the range fire and switched off the light. She could sleep now and dream of weddings.

15

It had been a difficult journey from Buckinghamshire to Somerset for Air Commodore Martin Black, for it involved several changes of trains and long, tedious waits at small country stations where children stared at him and their mothers pretended not to notice his appearance. He was still underweight and not fully fit, so tired easily, but at least now he was on the final leg of the journey that would take him to his wife and children.

Martin sat in the empty compartment feeling very much alone without Roger and the other men he’d been imprisoned with. He gazed out at the passing scenery as the train busily chuffed its way towards Taunton. There was nothing quite so lovely as the English countryside in the spring, but the sight of those familiar landmarks reminded him of the last time he’d made this journey, and how he’d almost ruined things with Anne by letting the stresses and strains of the war and his commitment to the men at RAF Cliffe cause friction between them. He could only thank God that Anne had understood what he’d been going through, and they’d parted as lovers; the ties that bound them as husband and wife strengthened and renewed.

That leave had been his last before he’d been shot down and captured two years ago, and although the thought of Anne and his children had kept him going in the camp – and on the long, torturous march across Germany – he knew what they would expect of him, and wasn’t at all sure if he could banish the horrors that haunted him day and night, and simply step back into family life as if nothing had happened.