[MaC] And so it begins ... The Fitzroys

[Mel Mason]

Christmas Eve had dawned bright and cold.  Frost rimmed the rubble of the 
bombed buildings as people hurried to work.  The newspaper seller who 
unintelligibly called his wares outside Mansion House underground station 
sent spurts of mist into the air as people hurried by on their way to work, 
bundled up against the cold, relieved that - for once- their sleep had been 
undisturbed by the drone of bombers overhead - and the detonation of bombs 
all too close.

It was cold, too, as people came home, laden with gifts and last minute 
purchases for the Christmas holidays.  Last year, Britain had been in the 
phoney war - there had been alarms and worries, of course, and everyone had 
known the sound of air raid sirens, and had known someone who had gone away 
to fight.  But danger had seemed far off - and very different thing (for 
those who could remember) from the grim Christmases of the Great War.

But 1940 was different.  All year long had been a sequence of disasters as 
one country after another had fallen into Herr Hitler's hands.  The German 
divisions had stormed across Europe - Denmark, Norway, the Netherlands, 
Luxembourg, Belgium ... and finally France.  So, as the summer came to its 
height, Britain stood alone to face the might of the German Reich, its 
troops evacuated in the miracle of Dunkirk, but its equipment abandoned on 
the beaches.

All that stood between Britain and defeat by the seemingly German army was 
the small frail Spitfires and Hurricanes of the RAF.  And as the long summer 
days began to fade, the Germans came again and again to win the air 
superiority they needed.  And again and again they were repulsed.

German superiority of the skies by day was thwarted.  A slim victory had 
been grasped ... but in its wake came the Blitz.

Now Londoners were becoming used to scrambling over rubble from bombed 
buildings as they made their way to and from work in darkness.  London was a 
city of night, with no lights allowed that might guide the German bombers. 
The sharp whistle and shout of the ARP wardens to "Put that light out!" was 
a constant warning of the rigour with which the blackout was enforced.  By 
night, the only light came from the fires started by the incendiary bombs.

But there had been a lull in the raids.  No-one was optimistic enough to 
think that the raids were over for good (indeed, some gloomy souls were 
predicting that the worse was yet to come), but it did seem that the Germans 
had slackened their attacks for Christmas.  Hard though it seemed to 
believe, the Germans would be sitting down to their Christmas dinners and 
celebrating the season of peace and goodwill - before the bombing started 
again.

And in London, there was a feeling of relief that was coming very close to a 
mood of celebration.  For a few, brief, precious nights it seemed they would 
not have to face crowding down into air raid shelters, or the improvised 
barracks created in the underground stations.  Tentative parties were 
planned.

One such party, rather less tentative than most, was being thrown by the 
London theatrical agent, Monty Fitzroy, for those - or rather most of 
those - who lived in the block of luxury service flats known as Mortmain 
Mansions.  Invitations had been sent around to most of the inhabitants - 
with one exception.  Hodges, the maintenance man, had been asked to act as 
wine waiter - a request that had been accompanied by a generous Christmas 
tip, and the suggestion that there would be "something in it for him" if he 
were able to help out.

"I don't see," said Esme Fitzroy, Monty's rather pallid wife, "why you 
couldn't have hired a proper wine waiter."

She was changing into a cocktail dress of grey-mauve crepe de chine, 
distinguished only by the number of wispy bows of grey silk that traced a 
diagonal line up the skirt and around her narrow hips.  The gown hung 
loosely, as though she had lost a lot of weight since purchasing it, or that 
it had once been designed for a much larger woman.  Monty seemed not to 
notice this - but then Monty Fitzroy (or so his detractors said) was not a 
man to notice much at all.  And this was even more true where his wife was 
concerned.

Now he was more concerned with adjusting his bow tie around his fat, jowly 
neck in front of the looking glass in their bedroom.

"Wine waiters cost money," he said.  "And they whine about getting 'ome. 
'Odges just 'as to nip downstairs."

Monty, unlike his wife with her genteel vocal over-corrections, made no 
effort to conceal his East End origins.  Born and bred in Stepney, was his 
boast.  Owning his first barrow at the age of fourteen after his old man 
copped it.  Perhaps Monty would have been a successful costermonger all his 
life if some strange quirk in his nature hadn't driven the boy to haunt 
music halls.  There he had fallen under the aegis of Sid Norton, an old time 
impresario, who had taught the boy the ropes of the business.  Variety was 
the breath of life to Sid, and the old music hall and variety theatre 
circuits.  But Monty had been a new man for a new age.  He'd seen the power 
of radio, and the need for compelling voices.  And he had watched, 
fascionated, the experiments at Alexandria Palace with the new medium, 
television.  Only serving the Home Counties at its inception in 1936, and 
now firmly switched off for the duration of the war.  But it would be back 
afterwards, Monty knew - and when it was, Monty Fitzroy was going to have a 
piece of it.

Esme Fitzroy sighed as she pinned a large cameo brooch at the neck of her 
dress.  People who knew the Fitzroys said that she had learned long ago the 
unwisdom of going against her truculent spouse.  Others, who perhaps knew 
the mouse-like wife better, concluded that perhaps she had her own defence 
... her own way of dealing with the life force that was Monty Fitzroy.

Now he gave a final scowl at his refelction in the glass and moved toward 
the door top the corridor and the living room beyond.

"'Ave to get a move on," he said.  "They'll be 'ere soon.  Where's 'Odges, 
that what I want to know."

Left alone, Esme Fitzroy looked for a moment at the closed door that marked 
her husband's departure.  The she rose swiftly and walked to the jewellery 
case that stood on her dressing table.  With a shaking hand she unlocked it, 
and then manipulated the almost invisible clasp at the back which triggered 
the hidden drawer.

There, stark white against the red velvet, lay an envelope, the name and 
address printed in bold capitals.  Slowly she drew it out, and then opened 
the flap, sliding out the single sheet of paper it contained.  One thing was 
visible as she did so - the subscription, in the same bold capitals.

"A Friend".



(OOC - and so it begins ...

Feel free to write your characters getting ready for the party, and arriving 
at the Fitzroys' flat.  Other NPC posts will be appearing shortly).