Chapter 1. Bored
August 1933
Simon was bored.
Bored, bored, bored.
He was also worried.
His mum wasn’t well and he’d been sent to stay with his aunt and her family. Aunt Ida did her best to make him comfortable and stop him fretting.
“I’m sure your mum will be fine,” she assured him as she handed him a freshly baked bun. “She just needs to rest until your new brother or sister is born. Your dad has to work at the forge so they can’t look after you at the moment.” She wasn’t as confident as she tried to sound, however. It had been eight years since her sister, Emma, had given birth to Simon. Since then, she’d suffered two miscarriages and her latest pregnancy threatened the same result.
“I know,” Simon said, “and it’s nice here, but there’s no one for me to play with.”
The problem was his cousins were both girls and there were no other boys around. Not that he particularly liked football knockabouts that most boys played but he was interested in aeroplanes and loved reading stories of Biggles in ‘The Modern Boy’ magazine and had been given a copy of ‘The Camels are Coming’ last Christmas. He enjoyed playing ‘dog fights’ with other lads – pretending to be Billy Bishop or Alan Ball; both of whom had won Victoria Crosses for their exploits against the Hun. He’d watch aircraft like the Hawker Fury or the Bristol Bulldog from a Royal Air Force landing field not far from his home a few miles outside Andover.
‘What would it be like to soar into the sky in the latest fighters?’ he’d wondered as he’d watched their aerobatics.
Not that he’d ever have a chance to find out. People from his background didn’t fly in aeroplanes let alone become pilots. The very best he could hope for would be working with the flying machines, perhaps as a mechanic. His father had followed in his father’s footsteps as a blacksmith – indeed, there had been smiths for at least five generations. As motor cars and mechanical devices had replaced horses, Simon’s father had learned how to repair them. Simon knew he was expected to follow the family tradition.
“Why don’t you go and see if Daphne and Grace would like to go for a walk in the woods? They’re up in the playroom with their friend Lucy,” Aunt Ida suggested. “You might see a woodpecker, I’m sure I heard one earlier. Here, take these currant buns up with you.”
It was true that walking through the woods was one activity that both Simon and his cousins all enjoyed.
The playroom had once been servants’ quarters in the attic of the rectory. Whilst rectors may have previously been considered on a par with the gentry, his uncle, the Reverend Geoffrey Bartlett’s income didn’t stretch to more than a cleaner twice a week. Converting the attic did mean that the sound of the children playing didn’t disturb his parish meetings or his concentration when he was trying to write his sermons in his study on the ground floor.
The door to the playroom was closed when he reached it but he could hear giggling from inside.
He knocked on the door – his cousins had made it very clear before that he wasn’t to just enter their rooms which, he assumed, included the playroom. After a few seconds, the door was opened by Grace. At eight years old, she was the younger of the two sisters so usually had to do Daphne’s bidding.
"Oh, it's you, Simon. Are those buns for us?” she asked, taking them from him. She took one and passed the other two to Daphne and Lucy. Seeing Simon was still standing in the doorway, she turned to him. “Was there something else?”
“Aunt Ida said to ask if you’d like to go for a walk in the woods. She said we might see a woodpecker.”
“We were just about to rehearse a play that Daphne has written,” Grace replied.
“Oh. Right then. It’s just that I don’t have anything to do or anyone to play with. Could I take part too?” Simon asked
“Not really, there isn’t a boy in the story, only four girls,” Daphne remarked.
“Unless you want to be a girl for the afternoon,” Lucy interjected. Turning to Daphne and Grace, she continued “Girls, there are four roles so if Simon takes one, we don’t need one of us to do two parts.”
“That’s true,” Daphne confirmed “and men always took the female parts in Shakespeare.”
“Well, Simon?” challenged Grace.
Simon considered the suggestion. It was only a play. It didn’t mean anything.
“Why not?” He shrugged his shoulders – anything would be better than being bored on his own.
“Just a moment. If Simon is going to be a girl for the afternoon, he, or rather she, needs to dress as one,” said Lucy. “You’re about her size, Grace, have you got something you could lend her?”
Simon swallowed. He hadn’t anticipated this. Reading out a girl’s part in a play was one thing. Wearing a dress was something quite different. What if his aunt was to see him or, even worse, his uncle?
“Do I have to?” he asked.
“No, you don’t,” said Lucy. “You can go and play on your own if you like. But if you want to take part in our girls’ play then you have to be a girl.”
She and his cousins sat looking at him; waiting for him to make up his mind.
He really was bored with being on his own.
“All right then,” he conceded.
Grace dashed down the stairs to her bedroom on the floor below before running back into the room a few minutes later.
“Here, put these on, you can get changed behind that screen," she said, handing Simon a bundle and pointing to a panel at the other end of the room.
Simon took the clothes Grace handed him and went behind the partition. He found that she’d given him a dress, petticoat, underwear, socks and shoes.
“Put them all on,” Grace instructed.
There wasn’t much difference in the style of the underwear or the socks compared with his own but they were lighter and coloured rather than plain white. When he drew them on, they felt softer against his skin. He wasn't sure which way round the petticoat went – but it seemed fine either way so he left it and pulled the dress over his head then did up the buttons. The shoes were slightly small but manageable.
He was self-
“You look lovely as a girl, Simon,” remarked Daphne. “Doesn’t she?”
“She certainly does, she can’t be called Simon though, it’ll need to be Simone,” agreed Lucy.
Grace just smiled. “Here’s your script, Simone,” she said handing her the pages that Daphne had typed up on the Underwood machine her father used for parish business and writing his sermons. Simone’s copy was the fourth set and with four sheets of paper and three of carbon paper to strike through, the keys had lost their impact and the words were barely legible.
Simone's self-
“I’ve brought you all some orange squash,” she announced as she came through the door. Then, realising what she was seeing, continued: “Can someone explain why Simon is dressed as a girl?”
“Mum!” cried Grace and Daphne in harmony.
“Aunt Ida!” exclaimed Simon and Lucy; the latter using the honorific title bestowed on parents’ close friends. All four then started to explain about the play.
“One at a time! Daphne, you explain.” She then listened while Daphne clarified why Simon was now Simone.
“Well, I don’t suppose there is any harm in it. I’m not sure if your father would approve though so best not let him find out,” she said.
Simon’s mum gave birth to a daughter on 12th October 1933 and he was allowed to return home at the end of the month ready for the second half of the Christmas term at school. His mum still had to take things easy but, now nearly nine, Simon was considered old enough to help around the house – laying the fires, washing up, making cups of tea for his mum and watching over baby Mary while his mum rested.
At Christmas, Simon was presented with a parcel that he eagerly unwrapped. It contained a dark green pullover, a green cricket-
“You’ll have to make do with your usual shorts and stockings for the rest of your Wolf Cub uniform,” his mum told him. He’d been looking forward to joining the Young Scouts and had already been accepted for membership as soon as he was nine years old, now just two weeks away.
