Their Finest Hour and a Half Read Free Page A

typing memoranda. “ Dear Cecil ,” – he assumed a high, prissy voice – “ yours of the first inst, I shall look into the matter of the amendment to Clause 9 of Form 3/B7 just as soon as the international situation permits  . . .’ ’ ’ He turned back to the window and laid his forehead against the glass. ‘Soon there’ll be no one left to write copy,’ he said. ‘Goods will be sold from giant cardboard boxes stamped “Rice” or “Hair oil”. Buxom Molly Brown will be replaced by a label saying: “Clean Your Teeth by Order of the Minister for Hygiene.!”’ He sighed again, misting the windowpane in front of him.
    â€˜I really had better go,’ said Catrin, after the moment of introspection had stretched out to half a minute.
    â€˜Best of luck, then,’ said Colin, insincerely. ‘Don’t trip over any red tape.’
    *
    From a distance, the Ministry of Information looked almost elemental, a chalk cliff rearing above the choppy roofs of Fitzrovia. From the main entrance, where Catrin stopped to tweak one stocking so that the darn was concealed by her coat, it looked more like a vast mausoleum.
    â€˜Authority?’ said the policeman at the door, and Catrin handed over her letter ( H/HI/F Division, Room 717d, Swain ) and was nodded through.
    Room 717d had clearly been part of a corridor before three sections of plywood had transformed it into a space only just large enough to hold a desk and two chairs. Catrin had been waiting there alone for nearly ten minutes when a young man whose name she didn’t quite catch poked his head round the door, checked that she was unoccupied, and proceeded to sit down, open a file and – without explanation or preamble – read her a series of jokes. Each time he finished a punchline he looked at her sharply, hoping, presumably, for laughter, but since his delivery possessed all the comic flair of a platform announcer it was hard to oblige, and Catrin could feel her mouth stiffening into a dreadful fake grin. ‘Just one more,’ he said, after the fourth. ‘An ARP warden goes into a butchers and looks at what he’s got on the slab. He’s got liver, he’s got kidneys, he’s got sheep’s hearts and he’s got a lovely great tongue. “I’m going to get you summonsed,” says the warden. “Why?” says the butcher. “I haven’t done nothing wrong.” “Oh yes, you has—”’ The young man frowned, and there was a pause while he re-read the line, lips moving soundlessly. ‘I’m so sorry,’ he said, ‘these are, of course, transcribed from actual conversations, hence the ungrammatical element which does tend to make them rather difficult to read. So anyway, the butcher says “I haven’t done nothing wrong”, and then the warden says, “Oh yes, you has, you haven’t put your lights out.”’
    He sat back and gazed at Catrin expectantly. There was a long moment. ‘Did you understand the pun?’ he asked, frowning.
    â€˜Yes, I did.’
    â€˜You understood that “lights” is a synonym for some form of offal? Lungs, I believe.’
    â€˜Yes.’
    â€˜And therefore the warden’s final comment is a play on the ARP’s habitual call to “put your lights out”.’
    â€˜Yes.’
    â€˜But you didn’t find the joke amusing?’
    â€˜Not really, no. Perhaps . . . in context.’
    â€˜In a more jovial forum, such as a public house, you mean?’
    â€˜Yes, maybe.’
    He made a note. ‘And would you say that your opinion of the authority and/or ability of air-raid precaution wardens would be adversely affected by hearing this particular piece of humour?’
    â€˜I don’t think so, no, but then my husband’s a part-time warden.’
    â€˜I see.’ He made another note. ‘And if