Chapter 8: Preparation

After about an hour's journey, the lorry stopped in what looked like a small aircraft hangar or large barn, and the women were unloaded under the watchful eyes of armed soldiers. One at a time, each woman was taken by a guard out of the hangar, and into the adjacent building where she was led through corridors and up many stairs until she was left in a small room containing only a bed, a chair, and chamber-pot. A small window mounted high in one wall was heavily barred to prevent escape.

Putting the chair onto the bed and climbing precariously up, Lady Johnson managed to hang on to the bars and to peer out of the window. She seemed to be on the top floor, the former servants' quarters of a large country house, almost a small stately home, and was evidently at the back of the building. On the paddock below a series of wooden huts, six in all, had been erected, and they were connected by wooden corridors. The whole place had enough barbed wire round it to fortify a small country. Evidently this was some form of military installation, yet there did not seem to be any troops about.

So engrossed was she in trying to work out where she was that she did not hear the door open, and nearly fell off the chair when a woman's voice said, "Oh my, that looks very precarious."

A young woman with a trolley had come into the room and was staring at Lady Johnson.

"Yes?" Jane asked.

"If you would be so kind as to descend, ma'am, I'm here to give you a manicure, pedicure and do what I can with your hair, ma'am," replied the girl, "They want you looking at your best for the dinner tonight."

Lady Johnson thought she must be going mad.

"One moment I'm a prisoner to be moved in silence from anywhere to anywhere by the rude soldiery, and the next you address me as royalty and talk of dinner, what dinner?" she demanded.

"Oh, didn't they tell you? It is the weekly formal mess dinner tonight and you will each be the escort for one of the senior officers."

"But I haven't any suitable clothes or..." the older woman's voice trailed off as she realised how foolish she must sound.

"Oh, don't worry, they'll see to all that," replied the girl as she buffed the nails on Lady Johnson's left hand.

"You seem to know all about it?"

"I've been here a while now, doing this job. I ran a beauty salon before the war and I got to make a living somehow, ain't I?" The manicurist's 'posh' voice disappeared in the stress of explaining her collaboration.

"What will happen?"

"Oh, you mean tonight?"

"Yes, girl," Lady Johnson was becoming impatient.

"Well, you all go into the ante-room and meet the officers. They ... er ... look you over and then you put on the dress they have chosen for you. Then you have dinner in the Senior Officers' Mess and then there is dancing and so forth."

Lady Johnson considered this and asked the questions the girl had obviously been trying to gloss over.

"So we go to meet them in our underwear?"

"Er ... no, ma'am. You go..."

" ... naked," the older woman finished for her, "And this 'look us over' consists of what?"