Here, as the men passed by my window, I caught a few words, uttered by that carrying voice. The stranger was saying: "What was the name of that girl I spoke to?"
What, I thought, irritably, had my name got to do with him? Again I felt the stab of anger with which I'd heard him ask me how long I thought I was going to stand "this"—the Land Army and roughing it in camp. Impertinence! Anyhow, I was at the end of my tether for tonight. Aching with fatigue, I got up and approached the laughing Vic.
"Please," I asked her, "could you show us where the bedrooms are?"
"Bedrooms?" echoed the big Land Girl, and then burst into a fresh peal of laughter. "Bedrooms? Hear that, girls? Celery-face wants to know where the bedrooms are!" General laughter. "No luxuries of that sort here, dear. As you were! Here's where we all sleep."
Blankly Elizabeth and I gazed about that bleak hall.
"On the floor," added Vic cheerfully.
"Floor!" I repeated, giving an appalled glance down at those hard scrubbed boards.
But here our Cockney friend relented.
"Ah, it's not come to that yet, even in the Land Army," she said. "Here, I'll show you." She put a large brown hand on the arm of each of us, led us to the further end of the hall and pulled aside a curtain.
Behind it an alcove was piled with rolled-up mattresses.