The Spark of Resistance: Women Spies in WWII

Chapter 3

Didi 

Didi tossed yet another rejection letter onto the floor. "The Women's Royal Naval Services only wanted drivers."

Her sister Jackie, older by four years, nodded at the paper on the ground. "I must have gotten twice as many as you. I have one just like that from the WRNS. I probably shouldn't have told them I can't drive in complete darkness with all of these black-outs."

"Do you think..." Didi cleared her throat. "Did it ever occur to you that we shouldn't have come here?" It hadn't been easy getting out of Occupied France, even though they were British citizens, but they'd eventually managed to escape via Spain. The entire journey had taken nearly six months, and now that they were finally free, relatively speaking, they were having difficulty securing a job.

Jackie raised a thin eyebrow. "What would you have done, stayed in France? You know the Germans regarded us as nothing but foreigners."

"We lived in France almost our whole lives. Britain feels more foreign to me."

"Well," Jackie bent down and picked the letter up off the floor. "If you want to go back and be subject to the will of the Nazis, then do it. I'm going to stay here and do what I can to fight the Germans." She crumpled the paper. "If only they would let me."

A few days later, Jackie received a note from a Captain Selwyn Jepson of the War Office asking for an interview.

"I told you my time would come," Jackie told Didi, the triumph obvious in her voice.

Didi snatched the notice from her sister. "He says you 'possess qualifications which may be of value in the war effort.' What does that even mean?"

"Why, I suppose it could mean nothing at all," Jackie replied loftily, clearly not believing her own proclamation.

For some reason, Didi felt the need to takeJackie down a peg. Everything had always come easy to her beautiful older sister. "Especially if they find out you can't drive during the blackout."

The words hit their mark and Jackie's smile drooped into a frown.

"On the other hand, maybe this Selwyn Jepson is an important man and needs you for a task no one else can do," Didi added in an attempt to cheer Jackie up. "The return address is the War Office, after all."

Jackie nodded. "I'm sure you'll get a similar letter soon."

But she didn't, and, as the date for Jackie's interview came closer, Didi grew even more anxious.

"Be sure to tell them about me," Didi called after Jackie as she left for the War Office dressed in her nicest dress, a smart blue one sprinkled with white polka-dots.

Jackie turned back and waved a gloved-hand. "I will."

"And good luck!"

Jackie straightened her straw hat before continuing down the street.

Didi spent a few tense hours waiting for Jackie to return. She meant to clean the small room they shared in the boarding house, but found it hard to concentrate on any one task.

"Well?" Didi asked by way of greeting once her sister came home.

"Well what?"

"What did Captain Jepson want?"

"It was a job as a driver for FANY- the First Aid Nursing Yeomanry."

"A driver? Did you tell him you can speak fluent French?"

"Yes."

Something about Jackie's behavior wasn't sitting right with Didi. "And the driving at night thing? He didn't mind about that?"