Free The Soldier's Daughter by Rosie Goodwin

to get on with it.’
    ‘Hmph!’ Mrs Brindley pulled her cardigan closer about her and stuck her feet out towards the fire. ‘I thought I’d catch the train into Coventry the other day and see if there was any more food goin’ over there,’ she went on, ‘an’ you’ll never believe what they’re doin’ now. Why, they’re only coverin’ up all the station signs, so if yer don’t know where yer goin’ yer wouldn’t know where to get off.’
    ‘Things are getting a bit grim,’ Briony acknowledged, hoping to change the subject, but Mrs Brindley wasn’t done yet, not by a long shot.
    ‘I thought I’d get hold o’ some wool to knit my Clal a nice new cardi fer when he comes home, but it’s as rare as hen’s teeth now so I’ve ended up unpickin’ one of his old ones to reknit it. Things are bad when you’re forced to do that, ain’t they? I’ve taken to listenin’ to
The Kitchen Front
on the wireless each mornin’ an’ all after the eight o’clock news, but all the recipes they’re givin’ out are about different ways to cook vegetables. I’m tellin’ yer, I shall turn into a bloody turnip or a carrot at this rate.’
    Briony stifled a giggle as she listened to the woman rant on, but deep down she knew that they didn’t really have a lot to be happy about.
    The newspapers weren’t giving them much to smile about either. Early in January, it was reported that two million young men in London between the ages of nineteen and twenty-seven had received their call-up papers, and things looked grim when the Germans gained ground in a fierce onslaught along a 120-mile front north of Paris.
    ‘It’ll be us they come after next, you just mark my words,’ Mrs Brindley said with conviction, and a ripple of pure terror coursed up Briony’s spine.
    When it was further reported on 9 January that 152 people had lost their lives when the
Union Castle
liner was sunk by a mine off the south-east coast, the public began to realise that the threat of invasion by Hitler’s army was drawing closer. The country now lived in fear.
    Things were no better at work either; Woolworths was operating on a skeleton staff. Now that so many men had been called up, women were taking their jobs and many of them had left the store in order to work in munitions factories.
    ‘It’s hardly worth turnin’ in to work,’ Ruth told Briony one evening on their way home. ‘There’s nothin’ worth sellin’ anyway, an’ I just wonder how much longer the place will stay open for. Yer can’t even get a decent pair o’ stockin’s any more, they’re like gold dust.’ She looked down at her legs and the unbecoming lisle stockings, the only ones that were available, and Briony knew that she was right and could only nod in agreement. Since her father had returned to his unit her spirits were low and it felt as if all she ever did was work. She was missing Ernie too and this made her feel guilty because she knew how much Ruth cared for him. Life seemed to be very complicated at present and sometimes she wished she could just hide her head under the covers and stay in bed all day. But of course that wasn’t possible. What would happen to her mum and the children if she gave in to her depression? Lois wasn’t even trying to hide the fact that she was drinking heavily any more, and most evenings by the time Briony got home she would be in a stupor, leaving the children to fend for themselves. The girl doubted that tonight would be any different and she was proved right when she entered the kitchen to find a state of pandemonium.
    The children were screeching excitedly about something whilst their mother dozed in the chair at the side of the fire.
    ‘So what’s all the excitement about then?’ Briony asked as she took her coat off.
    ‘We found this on our way home from school,’ Alfie told her as he held up a tiny, furry body – and Briony’s heart sank. It was a ginger kitten, very sweet admittedly, but the last thing she