THE CLOCKMAKER’S WIFE
Daisy Wood

Copyright

HarperCollinsPublishers

1 London Bridge Street

London SE1 9GF

www.harpercollins.co.uk

First published in Great Britain by HarperCollinsPublishers 2021

Copyright © HarperCollinsPublishers 2021

Cover design © Caroline Young, HarperCollinsPublishers 2021

Cover photographs © Joanna Czcogala/Trevillion Images (woman), Roy Bishop/Arcangel Images (steps), George W Johnson/Getty Images (Big Ben), Shutterstock.com (planes)

Daisy Wood asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

A catalogue copy of this book is available from the British Library.

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this ebook on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.

Source ISBN: 9780008402303

Ebook Edition © July 2021 ISBN: 9780008402310

Version: 2021-02-22

Dedication

To Philip, with love and gratitude

Author’s note

Big Ben – as the Great Clock at the Palace of Westminster has come to be known – is recognised around the world, a landmark that draws tourists like a magnet and tells Londoners they’re home. During the Second World War, however, the clock held an even greater significance. In prison camps, cellars, attics and back rooms all over Nazi-occupied Europe, people secretly tuned into wireless broadcasts from the BBC – and for most of the war, the chimes of Big Ben were used to announce the nine o’clock evening news. People everywhere were encouraged to pray for peace as they listened, and this sacred moment was known as the Silent Minute. The great bell represented freedom and better times to come; as long as it tolled, at least one country resisted oppression.

The Clockmaker’s Wife is a work of fiction. As far as we know, there was no conspiracy to destroy Big Ben on New Year’s Eve in 1940; certainly, no evidence has ever been found. The Houses of Parliament had been bombed in September of that year and were to be more seriously damaged in May 1941, when the Commons Chamber was destroyed by incendiaries, but these episodes were incidental rather than targeted. Yet such a plan isn’t inconceivable. St Paul’s Cathedral had only been saved by a miracle a couple of nights before, when over a hundred thousand bombs were dropped on the ancient City of London. The Palace of Westminster was similarly vulnerable, and the loss of such a beacon of hope as the clock tower would have been a terrible blow to morale.

Despite this imaginative leap, I have tried to ground the plot and setting of my novel in historical reality. When I began dreaming up the story, renovation work to the clock tower was already under way and a visit in person was impossible. Yet I was lucky enough to experience the next best thing: a talk at the Houses of Parliament by one of the guides, Catherine Moss. She and her colleague, Lindsay Schusman, know all there is to know about Big Ben and I’m extremely grateful to them both for their help, so generously given. At the time of writing, these renovations are still some way from completion, but the results will surely be spectacular. I’ve come to think of Big Ben as an old friend, and a trip up the clock tower is top of my wish list when the world returns to some kind of normality.

I wrote much of this novel during months of lockdown due to the coronavirus pandemic. It’s been a strange time, and one can’t help noting the similarities and contrasts with wartime Britain as we currently battle a more insidious, invisible enemy. Researching London during the Blitz has left me overwhelmed by the extraordinary courage of so many ‘ordinary’ people, men and women just like Nell and Arthur, and in awe of the sacrifices they made to ensure the freedom of generations to come. I couldn’t help thinking of my own grandmother, the original Daisy Wood, who lost her brother during the First World War and brought up her daughter, my mother, during the Second. How I wish I could talk to her now!

Contents

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

Author’s note

Prologue

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-Two

Chapter Twenty-Three

Epilogue

Acknowledgements

Keep Reading …

About the Author

About the Publisher

Prologue
London, April 1939

‘Not much further,’ Arthur calls down to Nell, who is labouring up the stone spiral staircase behind him. She’s wearing new shoes that have rubbed a blister on the back of her heel, and it’s been a long day, but she knows how much this visit means to Arthur so she perseveres. He’s rightly proud of his work, maintaining the clocks at the Palace of Westminster, and she knows it’s taken some negotiation with the Keeper of the Clock for permission to show her the greatest one of all: the huge turret clock that Nell in her ignorance used to call Big Ben. Arthur had quickly put her right. Big Ben, she knows now, refers to the vast bell that strikes the hours, rather than the clock itself.

She’s learned a lot about this clock since meeting Arthur – or rather, she would have learned a lot, if she weren’t so distracted by his steady brown eyes, gazing intently into hers, by the hollows under his cheekbones and the bluish stubble around his jaw, by that mysterious male presence that takes the words out of her mouth and the breath from her lungs. Sometimes they can talk for hours and it seems as though they’ve known each other for years; more often, she simply stares at the way his curly hair springs up from his forehead or the curve of his beautiful mouth and wonders how long she’ll have to wait until he’s kissing her. She thinks about him all the time. He’s on her mind from first thing in the morning until last thing at night, and people have begun to notice. The headmistress has had to have sharp words with Nell about leaving her personal life at home.

So now she smiles back at Arthur and tells him she’s fine, slips off her shoes and limps after him in her stockinged feet. First, he takes her to the clockmakers’ room, where their tools and equipment are stored. Technically, Arthur is employed by Saunders, an external company of clock and watchmakers, rather than the Palace of Westminster. Yet the Palace is where he and his colleagues spend most of their time, winding, adjusting and maintaining the hundreds of clocks that mark the hours as Parliament goes about its business. And also when it’s in recess, of course. There are two other clockmakers apart from Arthur: Ralph Watkinson (whom he likes) and Bill Talbot (whom he doesn’t).

Their room is low-ceilinged, with short windows beneath the overhanging dials above. Arthur shows her the workbench where his tools are neatly arranged, ready for the morning.

‘Sure I’m not boring you?’ he asks, and she hastens to reassure him. ‘You are a dear girl to be so interested,’ he says, blushing a little, and his flush deepens when she catches sight of her photograph in pride of place on the shelf, self-conscious in pearls and an evening gown. Dropping his eyes, he exclaims over her lack of shoes and binds her bleeding heel with his handkerchief, taking such care that she melts under his touch. She’s longing for him to kiss her when he straightens up, but instead he unlocks the door to an inspection hatch and shows her the weights running up and down the central shaft of the tower. She can just make them out, far below in the gloom. There are three weights, he explains, controlling the three gear trains by which the Great Clock operates: the striking train driving the hammer which drops against Big Ben, the chiming train that controls the quarter bells, and the going train that powers the clock hands. The striking and chiming trains are wound back up by electric motor when they reach the bottom of the shaft, Arthur says, but the going train has to be wound by hand, three times a week.

‘Goodness.’ Nell could listen to him talk all evening – although, to be perfectly honest, she pays more attention to his dimples than she does to the gear trains. He wants to share his great passion with her, and she knows this is a significant moment. Who would have thought the workings of a turret clock could be so romantic?

Arthur takes Nell’s hand and leads her through the gallery behind the four huge dials. Dusk is falling and the light bulbs behind each clock face are blazing; people on the ground over three hundred feet below will be looking up to check the time as they hurry to meet friends or lovers, or head home after work. Nell peers up at the milky glass. She can’t see through to the Roman numerals on the other side, but Arthur tells her they are over two feet high, and the minute hand is fourteen feet long. The scale is awe-inspiring.

After this excitement, they go up another flight of stairs to see the clock mechanism itself, an intricate arrangement of wheels, cogs, levers and ratchets laid out on a flatbed frame. The machinery was made in Victorian times; a work of art, combining beauty and precision. Nell’s face is beginning to ache from all the smiling when a tremendous racket starts above their heads, the smaller bells ringing out the quarter hour. She and Arthur put their hands over their ears, beaming at each other. I do love you, she thinks, and wonders when she’ll find the courage to tell him. Probably not tonight. He seems in a strange mood: preoccupied, distracted, distant. He’s probably tired after a day’s work, and of course he’s worried about the current state of affairs on the Continent, along with everyone else. They had a long conversation about that alarming little man Hitler the other night. Arthur’s parents are German but they moved to England before he was born – which, as things have turned out, was just as well.

At last the Westminster Chimes die away and the fly fans high up in the room come to a noisy, clattering halt.

Falling well and truly under the spell of this extraordinary place, Nell hurries after Arthur, up another flight of stairs to the belfry where Big Ben hangs in state; a caged beast behind an iron fence, with the quarter bells arranged around him like planets orbiting the sun. She leans over the wire-mesh barrier to lay her hand against his great scarred side and stand for a moment, drinking in the quiet atmosphere. Arthur, however, is in a hurry. He wants to show her the Ayrton light, which is lit when either House of Parliament is sitting after dark. Frowning, he looks at his watch and hustles her towards the open metal staircase as though they’re late for an appointment.

‘Hope you don’t mind heights,’ he says, bounding up the first few steps without looking back. Nell follows, trying to ignore the open iron latticework beneath her feet and the wind that steals under her crimson coat, freezing her stockinged legs. When they climb out onto the balcony running around the lantern, she’s glad of Arthur’s hand to hold, and gladder still when he puts his arm around her shoulders and draws her close, inhaling the scent of her hair, which she rinsed in lavender water, just in case this situation might arise. They gaze out over London, quiet in the deep blue haze of evening. The dolphin streetlamps along the Embankment are shining like strings of pearls as the sinking sun outlines fleecy clouds in pink and gold; the lights of barges heading towards the docks gleam like fireflies on the water. Nell can see as far as Tower Bridge in one direction and Lambeth Bridge in another, spot the golden angel glinting on the memorial outside Buckingham Palace, and glimpse Nelson standing proud on his column at Trafalgar Square. The cars crossing Westminster Bridge look like Matchbox toys from this height, and the roar of the traffic is muted. She and Arthur are completely alone, with this extraordinary scene laid out before them.

The sight of his serious face casts a shadow over her happiness. Now, at last, she understands why he’s brought her here. ‘War’s coming, isn’t it?’ she asks, so quietly that she might be talking to herself. ‘You want me to see the city before everything changes.’

‘I think it’s inevitable, sadly,’ he replies. ‘And sooner rather than later.’

Now a terrible fear clutches her heart. ‘Please don’t tell me you’re leaving. Are you about to say goodbye?’ Ridiculous tears spring to her eyes; she’ll blame them on the wind. He looks away, biting his lip. ‘Don’t go,’ she begs, abandoning all trace of dignity. ‘You needn’t, Arthur, not till they send for you. Let other men play the hero.’

He takes her hand. ‘I have brought you here for a reason, but it’s not that,’ he says, gazing into her eyes. ‘We haven’t known each other long, dearest Nell, but it’s been long enough for me to have fallen head over heels in love with you. Let’s make a home and grow old together. We might never be rich but I swear, I’ll move heaven and earth to make you happy. Oh, damn, I meant to do this properly.’ He starts patting his pockets. ‘Where is it? I’m sure … Ah, yes, here we are.’

He produces a small black box and, sinking to one knee, opens and offers it up to her. ‘Nell Roberts, I’m only a humble clockmaker, but would you do me the honour of becoming my wife?’ When she doesn’t reply instantly he repeats, with the merest hint of desperation, ‘Will you marry me, darling girl?’

Laughing and crying at the same time, lost for even the simplest of words, Nell helps Arthur to his feet. Her expression is all the answer he needs. He takes the ring from its velvet bed and slips it on her finger and then, at last, he kisses her; the most magical kiss there has ever been or will be again. At that very moment the world explodes as the bells beneath their feet begin to chime, followed by a few seconds of silence before the mighty hammer drops and Big Ben rings out in celebration. Arthur’s timing is impeccable – naturally.

Chapter One
London, November 1940

Nell looked at the clock for what felt like the hundredth time. Arthur had never been home as late as this before. It was almost eight o’clock. What on earth could have happened? The bombers had been coming earlier and earlier – almost as soon as it was dark, sometimes – but so far the night had been quiet and the alert hadn’t sounded, so he couldn’t have been caught up in a raid. She went to the front room and pulled aside the blackout blind to look out. It was dark and quiet, the moon only a fingernail paring and a solitary searchlight roaming the clouds. She could make out the bulk of a couple of barrage balloons, bobbing and swaying from their moorings like vast tethered animals. The street was empty, apart from a couple of ARP wardens standing on the corner, playing their torches over the house that had been bombed a couple of months before. Rumour had it that a tramp had moved in, though no one had actually seen him. Nell dropped the blind; those men could spot a chink of light at fifty paces.

Sighing, she walked back down the hall, edging past the pram. The liver she had queued an hour to buy had been drying out in the oven since half past six; Arthur would probably break a tooth if he tried to eat it now. Upstairs, Alice gave a drowsy, half-hearted wail. Nell stood for a moment to listen, holding her breath, but the baby seemed to have settled down so she carried on to the kitchen, to find the largest mouse she had ever seen – could it even have been a rat? – running across the floor. She couldn’t help screaming, and then of course Alice woke up and screamed too, and the house was in uproar when Arthur’s key turned in the lock.

‘Arthur! Where have you been?’ she cried, clutching her sobbing baby, on the verge of tears herself. ‘I was so worried! Supper’s ruined and we’ve nothing else to eat except a tin of corned beef that I was saving for the weekend. I was trying so hard to make everything lovely but the house is infested with vermin and it’s all too ghastly for words.’

‘You poor thing. Here, give Alice to me.’ Gently, Arthur scooped up the baby and walked her up and down, humming under his breath. Alice buried her damp face in his shoulder, hiccupped a couple of times and fell asleep.

‘But you haven’t even had time to hang up your things.’ Full of remorse, Nell took off his hat while he shrugged his arms out of his coat so she could relieve him of that, too. His clothes were cold and damp, and smelt of soot. ‘Oh, I’m the worst wife in the world!’ she burst out. ‘I’m meant to change and put on fresh lipstick before you come home and here I am, nagging like some awful harpy. Can you forgive me?’

He smiled. ‘As long as you can forgive me for being so late. And, darling, I wouldn’t mind if you came to the door in sackcloth and ashes.’ He kissed the top of her head. ‘Why don’t you make a pot of tea while I put Alice back in her cot and then we can decide what to do about supper and vermin.’

She shouldn’t have mentioned the mouse, Nell realised, putting the kettle on to boil. Arthur might use that against her in their ongoing debate – it wasn’t an argument, not yet – that was becoming increasingly heated as the bombing continued.

‘So how was your day?’ she asked him brightly when he came back downstairs. ‘Is Mr Watkinson back at work yet?’

‘Sadly not.’ He took a sip of tea and gave a small involuntary shudder.

‘Sorry. We’re out of fresh milk so I had to use powdered.’ What a terrible housewife she was.

‘At least it’s hot,’ he said gamely. ‘Well, warm.’

‘Warmish,’ Nell said, and they laughed.

‘Talbot’s been up to his usual tricks,’ Arthur went on. ‘I couldn’t leave without checking the work he can’t be bothered to finish. He’s getting more slapdash than ever and he’s not training the lad properly, either. Sam’s picking up all sorts of bad habits. And when I point out where Talbot’s gone wrong, he goes off at the deep end. He can’t bear any sort of criticism. We need Watkinson to keep the peace. Still, enough of my woes. What’s this about the house being infested?’

‘I thought I saw a mouse,’ Nell replied, ‘but it was probably just my imagination.’ She retrieved Arthur’s plate from the oven and placed it in front of him. ‘Now, do your best. I’ve eaten already.’ Only potatoes and a slice of bread and marge, but she wasn’t particularly hungry.

‘I’m absolutely ravenous.’ And he must have been, because he managed to polish off the liver and most of the potatoes that had collapsed into a heap of grey mush. They had learned to eat supper quickly, before the air-raid siren inevitably sent them hurrying to the shelter.

‘I’ve got a surprise for you,’ Arthur said, when he had forced down the last mouthful. ‘Close your eyes and hold out your hands.’

He put something round and smooth in her cupped palms. She gasped when she saw it. ‘An orange! Where on earth did you find that?’

‘It fell off the back of a lorry.’ He grinned, delighted by her reaction.

Nell dug her fingernail into the fruit’s waxy peel and inhaled the sharp citrus scent. It had been months since she’d seen an orange in the shops, let alone held one. The skin was already wrinkled and the fruit probably wouldn’t last till Christmas, more than a month away. She would keep it till the weekend, she decided, and share it with Alice and Arthur after tea. Maybe Alice could eat her segments in the bath, so as not to make a mess of her clothes. They were running low on soap powder and even a bib took ages to dry at this time of year.

‘I want you to eat it all yourself,’ Arthur said, as if reading her thoughts. He put his plate in the sink, scooped up her hair and kissed his favourite spot at the nape of her neck. ‘You’re looking rather run down these days, my darling. You know how I worry.’

She did indeed. He went on, ‘Thought any more about what we discussed the other day?’

‘I’m not going to change my mind,’ she replied. ‘We belong together, Arthur – that’s what we’ve always said. Whatever this war throws at us, we’ll face it side by side.’

He sat down again, his face serious. ‘There’s Alice to think about now. It’s not fair to put her through all this, not when you could both be safe in the country.’

Nell stuck out her jaw. ‘If the Queen won’t leave London, I don’t see why I should.’

‘But the Queen lives in Buckingham Palace, not a terraced house in Vauxhall.’

Nell sighed. ‘Let’s not go over this again, not when we’re both so tired. We’re just going around in circles. We’ll talk about it at the weekend, I promise.’ She glanced at the clock. ‘Nearly time for the news.’

They went through to the front room and Nell switched on the wireless. Now there was an added incentive to tune in: since the previous Sunday, Armistice Day, the pips introducing the nine o’clock news had been replaced by the chimes of Big Ben. Arthur had been so proud. People all over the country would be listening to that solemn sound, united in love for their country. She smiled at him across the hearth as the notes died away, but he was deep in thought and didn’t notice. Sighing again, she turned her attention to the world beyond their small terraced house. There was encouraging news from North Africa, apparently: thousands of Italian soldiers were surrendering in Egypt and British troops had captured some fort or other in Libya.

She yawned, her eyes drooping. The siren hadn’t sounded yet and it was getting late; perhaps tonight they would be lucky. ‘Please, God,’ she prayed to herself, ‘let us not have to go to the shelter.’ It was a selfish request, given the suffering some people had to endure, but she’d come to loathe the Anderson with a passion. The shelter stood in the garden of their neighbours, Mr and Mrs Blackwell, who had generously offered to share it when the raids had started, what seemed like a lifetime ago.

‘We wouldn’t hear of you going to a public shelter, Mrs Spelman,’ Mrs Blackwell had said. ‘Neighbours have to stick together these days.’

None of them had had any idea they would be spending so much time together, but London had been bombed relentlessly since that first week of September. Night after night, Nell had stumbled along the icy garden path, Alice clutched to her chest in a cocoon of blankets. Four slippery moss-covered steps led down into the shelter’s chilly interior, where spiders and possibly rats lurked in every corner, and a frog had once hopped onto her foot; it had squatted there for a moment, staring at her in the light of a candle with its wet black eyes. Nell had always hated to be shut up in any confined space, let alone one that smelt of damp, mouse droppings and worse. She knew Alice felt the same. Most of the time, her daughter was an undemanding baby, but her small body would start to tense as soon as she caught sight of the shelter’s forbidding entrance.

The Anderson was furnished with an easy chair near the entrance and two bunk beds standing opposite each other. Nell slept on the bunk above Mrs Blackwell with Alice in a Moses basket beside her, while Arthur took the berth on top of Stanley Blackwell. This ménage was completed by the Blackwells’ elderly terrier, Jack, who lost control of his bodily functions at the first explosion and would whine throughout the night in a pitch that set Nell’s teeth on edge. Outside, the sirens wailed, bells clanged, bombs detonated and buildings collapsed in an avalanche of brick and stone. Under the Anderson’s turf roof, Mr Blackwell whistled or snored, Mrs Blackwell knitted and sucked peppermints and Jack keened. Arthur was restless, tossing and turning and sometimes talking in his sleep. Once he had even sat bolt upright and shouted something in German, which had sent Mrs Blackwell into hysterics.

It was kind of the Blackwells to let them use the shelter, Arthur reminded Nell; they didn’t have to. Mr Blackwell had built it himself in his back garden and made a gate in the fence so the Spelmans could slip through from next door. Their garden was half the size of the Blackwells’ and concreted over, otherwise Arthur would have put in an Anderson himself. They were lucky to have such good neighbours, Nell told herself as she lay sleepless through the wild nights. There was a surface shelter barricaded with sandbags a few streets away, but Arthur wouldn’t hear of her using it. Those brick-built shelters were a death trap, he said; you were more likely to be killed by one collapsing on top of you than by being caught out in the street. And surely it was better to spend the night with people they knew, rather than strangers who might have all sorts of unsavoury habits?

Nell wondered about this. Mrs Blackwell’s habitual expression was one of disapproval. Her lips were usually pursed and she frowned ferociously even when asleep. She felt sorry for Alice, and said so on numerous occasions. ‘Poor little mite!’ she’d remark, shaking her head as she tweaked back the blanket, exposing Alice to draughts. ‘She’s looking very peaky. London’s no place for a baby, not at a time like this.’

Mr Blackwell, on the other hand, had a genial air and a variety of cheery maxims at his disposal. He’d retired from his job as a mechanic on the buses but had gone back to work once the war started; thankful to get away from Mrs Blackwell, Nell suspected. His bulk took up a lot of space in the shelter but he was a comforting presence, by and large – especially on the nights Arthur was fire-watching at the Palace of Westminster.

Now, the familiar, stomach-churning blare of a siren startled Nell awake. She opened her eyes to find Arthur smiling at her so tenderly that she couldn’t help smiling back. ‘There I was, hoping we might have a night off at last,’ she said, stretching her arms above her head.

He helped her to her feet, hugging her fiercely for a moment. ‘Chin up, old girl. This can’t last forever.’ She laid her head against his shoulder, breathing in the beloved smell of his soap and aftershave. ‘Better not linger,’ he said, detaching himself. ‘You fetch the baby and I’ll bring the valuables.’

Upstairs, Alice lay on her back, fast sleep with her thumb in her mouth and her dark hair sticking up in tufts. Nell couldn’t bear to wake such a precious creature and take her to that awful place, to be pitied by Mrs Blackwell. Perhaps she would just pick her up so gently that she wouldn’t stir, and they would sit together under the kitchen table, just the two of them. It would be cosy there, sheltered by the chimney breast. If Alice did wake up, she would sing her gently back to sleep. Arthur would understand.

Except, of course, that he wouldn’t. There was nothing for it. Nell slipped her hand under Alice’s damp, warm head that smelt of sugared almonds and lifted her out of the cot. Immediately, the baby’s back arched and she let out a howl of protest.

‘I know, I know,’ Nell murmured, bundling her up in the quilt. ‘I’m sorry, my darling. Time for the horrid old Anderson.’

By the time they were hurrying out into the garden, the night was lit up by parachute flares and somewhere close by, sticks of incendiary bombs were already screaming towards the earth. The crash of nearby explosions sounded in her ears and the ground over which she was running seemed to shake and tilt. She stumbled and nearly fell, holding on to the baby for dear life. Behind her, Arthur shouted something she couldn’t hear. Alice might have been crying but it was impossible to tell, given the commotion.

Mr Blackwell was standing at the bottom of the steps in his siren suit and tweed cap, peering out into the night. ‘There you are,’ he said, as Nell threw herself down the steps with Arthur close on her heels. ‘Thank goodness! Now we’re all present and correct. Come in and make yourself comfy.’

A candle stuck in a saucer cast flickering shadows over the brick walls of the shelter. Its light revealed Mrs Blackwell sitting on the lower bunk, wearing an overcoat over her nightie and a pair of wellingtons. Her curlers were covered with a paisley headscarf. ‘Comfy, in here!’ She gave a bitter laugh and unwound another length of wool. ‘Mind where you’re treading, dears. Jack ate some tripe yesterday and it seems to have disagreed with him.’ She began knitting with some ferocity. ‘And how’s the poor little mite?’

‘Cutting another tooth, I’m afraid,’ Nell replied, catching her breath. ‘I’ve pinned a bickiepeg to her vest but she’s not happy.’

‘Of course she isn’t,’ Mrs Blackwell said. ‘She wants to be safe in the country, where it’s lovely and quiet, not stuck down here.’

‘Cheer up for Chatham, wooden legs are cheap,’ said Mr Blackwell obscurely, poking Alice with a beefy finger and making her howl.

Outside, the world split apart in a cacophony of thuds and crashes. How strange it was, Nell thought, to be shut up in this godawful spot with the Blackwells, of all people, while some unknown people up in the sky tried to kill them. Arthur took Alice from her arms while she hung up her coat and swept their mattresses for debris and snails.

‘At least we’ve all made it down here safe and sound.’ Mr Blackwell rubbed his hands together. ‘I told you what Maurice said to his missus, didn’t I? When she wouldn’t leave the house without her dentures?’

‘Yes, you did,’ Nell said, smiling dutifully. Several times, she added in her head. Mr Blackwell worked on the principle that if a joke was worth telling once, it was worth repeating ad infinitum.

‘He said, “Come on, Betty! Hitler’s dropping bombs, not sandwiches!”’ Mr Blackwell shook his head, chuckling. ‘He’s a caution, that Maurice. “Bombs, not sandwiches!” He just came out with it, quick as a flash.’

‘Jam puffs would be more up Betty’s street,’ Mrs Blackwell remarked. ‘She wouldn’t bother bending down to pick up a sandwich. The woman’s always had a sweet tooth, that’s why she’s so fat – even now, on eight ounces of sugar a week for the whole family. She must be taking Maurice’s share, and the kiddies’ too. Either that or she’s getting a supply on the black market.’

What would Arthur and the Blackwells do if I screamed out loud? Nell wondered. They’d put it down to nervous exhaustion, probably, and they might well be right. Arthur had tried to help by advising her to meditate. Her body might be trapped in the shelter but her mind was free to wander at will. He, for example, imagined the chalet high in the Swiss Alps where he’d once spent a holiday with his German cousins: ten of them, crammed into a small hut that smelt of cedar wood and smoke, its shingles creaking under the weight of snow and icicles that hung like transparent daggers. They had been marooned, cut off from the everyday world by a soft white blanket that muffled the sound of their footsteps but sharpened their senses. He had never known such a profound sense of peace, never felt so intensely alive as in that pure, cold air.

Nell did her best to follow his advice. Her sanctuary was with him. He would be waiting for her up in the clock tower, making some minute adjustment to the machinery. He was single-minded; that was one of the things she loved most about him. Every task received his full attention, from heaving coal from the cellar to nudging the tiniest saw-toothed wheels and cogs into place with tweezers. When he looked at her with that steady, intent gaze, she felt as though she were being seen for the first time. In her mind’s eye, the Great Clock would be running smoothly and the room would be quiet, apart from the steady chink of the pendulum rod every two seconds. Arthur would lay down whatever cloth or gauge he happened to be holding and take her by the hand. She could feel his warm palm against hers, smell the oil on his overalls. Together they would climb up to the lantern at the top of the tower and look out over pre-war London, intact and beautiful in the drowsy evening light – just as it had been on that unforgettable evening he’d asked her to marry him. The parks would be green and leafy, the small Wren churches still standing peacefully in ancient, unblemished streets. Even the shabby terraces of South London across the river would look picturesque from that height; she felt a nostalgic fondness for them now so many had been blown apart. Arthur’s arm would be around her shoulder and – how could she have forgotten? – Alice, of course, would be on her hip, chubby and beaming.

To date, however, Nell had never made it as far as the belfry in her mind’s eye. Her reverie would inevitably be interrupted by Alice grizzling, or Jack yapping, or Arthur mumbling, or Mr Blackwell snoring, or Mrs Blackwell harrumphing about on the bunk below – and sometimes all of these distractions at once.

‘Goodnight, darling,’ Arthur whispered now, giving her a peck on the cheek. ‘Sweet dreams.’

She laid Alice in her basket on the top bunk and climbed up to lie beside her. The corrugated iron roof was only a couple of feet above their heads but she tried not to think about that. The baby began to cry and wouldn’t be distracted by the soggy rusk, so Nell turned discreetly on her side and fumbled under her jumper. Alice had been weaned for over a month and her breast milk was drying up, but a feed usually comforted them both. Not tonight, though. She yelped as her daughter’s new tooth sank into her nipple. ‘Bottles from now on for you, young lady,’ she whispered, readjusting her clothes. Alice was growing up fast; she was crawling already and soon she’d be into everything. Where could a child play safely in London? The parks were full of barbed wire and gun emplacements, the ground littered with lumps of shrapnel and broken glass.

She stroked the baby’s head, humming softly, until Alice’s breathing quietened and she grew still. A lull had descended on the fire storm outside and they were both drifting into sleep when the most tremendous crash seemed to pick up the shelter and shake it until its teeth rattled, like a dog killing a rat. Debris rained down from the roof onto Nell’s face, Alice shrieked, Jack yapped and Mrs Blackwell screamed. Nell sat up, grabbing the baby to her chest. The bunk swayed beneath her, threatening to collapse. ‘God save us!’ Mrs Blackwell cried, rolling sideways out of the rickety structure, while Mr Blackwell bellowed for everyone not to panic.

‘It’s all right, sweetheart.’ Arthur’s steady voice cut through the chaos. ‘I’m here.’ She reached for his hand and clung to it, speechless, the baby sandwiched between them. ‘We’re safe,’ he murmured, over and over again, and somehow she believed him.

The racket seemed to last forever. Eventually, after what might have been long minutes or only a few seconds, the pounding died down and an uneasy calm descended.

‘That was a close one.’ Mr Blackwell switched on the emergency torch, revealing a scene of disarray. Mrs Blackwell was scrambling to her knees amid a tangle of wool, her dressing gown and nightie riding up to reveal a sagging thigh. There was no sign of Jack, although a low moan under the other bunk and the stench of rotten eggs gave his presence away. A carpet of stones, dirt and shards of brick littered the upper bunks and the wooden pallets that served as the Anderson’s floor.

Arthur smoothed Nell’s hair away from her forehead, scanning her face. ‘Hitler certainly put us through the wringer that time,’ she said, smiling shakily. Alice took a shuddering breath before screwing up her face and letting out a piercing cry.

‘All right, Enid?’ Mr Blackwell helped his wife up. ‘Mrs Spelman? How’s the baby?’

‘Fine, I think.’

‘Nothing wrong with her lungs, at any rate,’ said Mrs Blackwell, dusting herself off. ‘I wonder who’s copped it this time.’

‘I’ll take a look in a minute,’ her husband said.

‘You will not,’ she retorted. ‘You’ll stay in here till it’s light. I’m not having you blundering about, falling into craters and God knows what.’

‘All’s well that ends well,’ Mr Blackwell replied philosophically. ‘At least we’re still in one piece.’

‘Nip of brandy?’ Mrs Blackwell took a swig from her hip flask and held it up to Nell, who accepted it gratefully.

Arthur scooped Alice from her arms, cradling the baby’s head with his hand. ‘I’ll sit with this little one in the chair for a while. Try to get some sleep, darling. With a bit of luck, the fun’s over for tonight.’

Nell’s heart was still thumping, her hands shaking and clammy. ‘I couldn’t possibly sleep.’

‘Well, then, just lie still for a while.’

Despite her protestations, Nell managed to drift into a restless doze. Every now and then, she would open her eyes to see Arthur sitting with Alice in his arms, keeping vigil as he waited for the dawn.

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