Mrs Bradley said dismissively.
Sylvia saw her chance drifting away and quickly piped up. ‘I wouldn’t mind. I think I’d like it.’
‘Well, I’ll put in a word for you then,’ said Dolly with a smile. ‘Ta-ra!’ She was gone before Mrs Bradley had a chance to protest.
Sylvia was ecstatic when, a few days later, Dolly gave her the news that she was to be given a trial period as a comptometer operator. She had no idea what that meant, but she didn’t care. All she knew was that she would be joining the stylish women who headed into town every morning.
When she arrived at Charing Cross, Sylvia was almost knocked over in the fray as everyone bustled off the train and hurried to the exit. She had only been into central London once before, when she was a child and her father had taken her to Madame Tussauds. Although she was older now, she was still struck by how big everything was, and how busy it felt compared to Woolwich.
Dolly had given Sylvia written instructions for getting the bus up to Piccadilly, which she followed carefully, finally alighting outside the hotel’s grand Palladian façade. The billing office was up a little spiral staircase at the side, and when she arrived a rather intimidating manageress called Miss Frank showed her how to clock in with a card. Then she sat Sylvia down in the office and explained how to use the comptometer – which turned out to be an adding machine for processing the hotel’s bills.
Sylvia did her best to listen, but her attention was caught by a large half-moon window that overlooked the street. Below, Mayfair thronged with exotic-looking men, from Free French and Polish soldiers to various foreign dignitaries.
‘Here comes our maharaja!’ one girl shouted, and all the others ran to the window, as a handsome Sikh in a bright-blue turban walked past.
‘Comes past the same time every day,’ said a girl called Peggy, who sat at the desk next to Sylvia’s. ‘I reckon he’s got a princess hidden away in one of the hotels who he goes to visit secretly.’
‘Back to work, girls,’ Miss Frank said, and they all returned to their machines.
Over the course of the day, Sylvia learned that the people-watching was considered the best part of the job at the Piccadilly, and took up much of the girls’ time. And increasingly, it was Americans who were the main players in the movie unfolding outside their window, as the whole area was taken over by the soldiers of the ‘friendly invasion’.
The first GIs had come to the British Isles in January 1942, less than two months after the bombing of Pearl Harbor, and by the summer there were tens of thousands of them arriving every month. Mayfair had become known as ‘Little America’, since the US Embassy and US Army headquarters were on Grosvenor Square, and its grand Georgian houses had been turned into accommodation and offices for US admin staff. An Englishman on the streets of Mayfair now looked like the odd one out.
Directly opposite the Piccadilly Hotel was the USO Club, and Sylvia and her colleagues could see the GIs swaggering in and out in their smart uniforms. They were quite unlike the Tommies of the British Army in their heavy serge – the better cut and higher-quality material of the Yanks’ outfits made it hard to tell an officer from a private. The stripes on their sleeves, which were upside down from the British perspective, only confused matters further. Then there was the way they moved – often seen slouching with their hands in their pockets, or leaning against a wall chewing gum, they lacked the straight-backed gait of British military discipline. Their relaxed marching style, carried out in rubber-soled boots, had even earned the nickname ‘the soft-shoe shuffle’.
Their approach to women also seemed confident and direct by local standards. From her window at the hotel, Sylvia watched countless young American servicemen chatting up attractive young women in the street, sometimes employing the ‘reverse handkerchief trick’ where they dropped a coin in the woman’s path so that she would pick it up and begin a conversation.
Despite the apparent confidence of the GIs she watched, however, Sylvia couldn’t help feeling sorry for them. ‘I reckon they must be lonely,’ she told Peggy. ‘They’re so far away from home.’
‘Not lonely for long, I’ll bet,’ her colleague laughed, gesturing towards a GI who had just hooked a young English girl onto his arm.
Sylvia gravitated towards Peggy, thanks to her cheeky sense of humour, and much of the rest of their day was spent in fits of giggles, which they tried to suppress whenever Miss Frank was within earshot. By clocking-out time, Sylvia left the Piccadilly Hotel happy that she had made a new friend, and looking forward to her next day working ‘Up West’.
A few days later, Peggy came into the billing office buzzing with excitement. ‘Guess what, Sylvia?’ she said. ‘The American Red Cross are looking for girls to volunteer at their clubs. We could go and sign up after work.’
The Red Cross had set up numerous clubs in central London to cater for the GIs based there, as well as the thousands who would pour in from all over the country when their two days a month’s leave came up. On Piccadilly Circus was the famous Rainbow Corner club, open twenty-four hours a day, where the GIs could shoot pool, play pinball, eat hamburgers and waffles, and generally get a taste of ‘home’.
‘I will if you will,’ Sylvia replied enthusiastically. She was delighted at the thought of doing something to help the Americans, and Peggy seemed quite keen on the idea too, if the grin on her face was anything to go by.
After work that day, the two girls took themselves to the US Embassy for an interview. A Red Cross lady in a military-style blue uniform took down their names and addresses, and asked what their parents did for a living. I hope they don’t only want posh girls, Sylvia thought to herself, as she explained that her dad worked at Greenwich Gas Works and her mum made shell casings at Woolwich Arsenal.
But the American woman didn’t seem to be put off by anything that Sylvia said. ‘The most important thing is being warm and friendly,’ she told her. ‘Whatever problems you have in your own life, you check them at the door. Our boys deserve a good welcome the moment they step inside a Red Cross club.’
She explained that Sylvia and Peggy would be sent to the Washington Club on nearby Curzon Street, and would be expected to work there two nights per week. Sylvia’s first three-hour shift would be the following Tuesday, while Peggy would start later in the week.
When she arrived on Curzon Street after work on Tuesday, Sylvia found the club easily. It was housed in the Washington Hotel, which had suffered bomb damage during the Blitz but had recently reopened, and as she passed under a big blue awning and through the revolving front door, she felt a thrill of excitement go through her.
Inside, she was met by a young woman in Red Cross uniform. ‘You must be the new volunteer,’ she said. ‘Follow me.’
Sylvia was aware of music playing in the distance, as the young woman led her down a corridor leading further into the hotel. On either side of them were racks of American newspapers and magazines from various states, with pride of place given to the Stars and Stripes, the servicemen’s newspaper, written by American journalists in London and distributed by the News of the World. As they passed into a large room at the end of the corridor, the music got louder, and Sylvia could make out the final bars of ‘I’ll Be Seeing You’ giving way to the lively beat of Glen Miller’s ‘In the Mood’.
The room was filled with GIs – some playing pool, some jostling for control of the jukebox, and others taking doughnuts from a silver machine in the corner – while half a dozen young women rushed around serving them. A smell of apple pie suffused the air, and Sylvia could hear snatches of conversation in a variety of distinctive American accents, from the rapid, nasal speech of New York to the lazy drawl of Alabama. It really did feel like being in another country, she thought.
The kitchen was a small affair at the back of the room, and inside Sylvia could see volunteers peeling potatoes and washing dishes. ‘So, what can I do?’ she asked, keen to get stuck in.
‘You can start by clearing the plates off the tables,’ the other girl told her.
Sylvia