Secret Soldiers

by Keely Hutton

  Between long drags on his cigarette, the street urchin whistled loudly to the music, drowning out the Irish tenor’s stirring voice with his shrill, off-key accompaniment. When he noticed Thomas glaring at him, the lanky boy blew out several quick, piercing notes, each carried on a puff of smoke, and winked at Thomas.

  Clenching his jaw, Thomas stared at the man standing in front of him. He counted the stitches straining along the seam of the man’s coat to keep his gaze from sliding back to the cheeky boy. He had to focus on the tasks at hand: securing the recruiting officer’s signal to move to the right, getting to the Western Front, and finding James. But first, he had to remember the correct name and date.

  Timothy Bennett, March 1, 1899.

  As the man at the front of the line stepped up to the table, Thomas took a deep breath and pulled back his shoulders. He licked his palms and ran them over his hair in an attempt to tame the half dozen cowlicks sticking up in every direction. He failed, but decided for once the disobedient tufts might be a blessing. They easily gave him another quarter inch of height.

  While the officer questioned the older recruit, Thomas listened and shifted in his worn boots, trying to find a comfortable position. The scraps of cloth he’d used to line his boots in hopes of gaining some height had bunched into sweaty wads beneath his soles during the walk from Charing Cross to Trafalgar Square. They dug into him like pebbles with each step, and his feet ached from the long journey.

  Before Thomas could review his fake identity one last time, the man in front of him stepped to the right, and Thomas stepped forward.

  “Name,” the army officer stated without looking up from his paperwork.

  “Timothy Ben—”

  Thomas’s voice cracked, and the officer glanced up, taking in the smidge of a boy standing before him. Thomas cleared his throat. “Timothy Bennett, sir.”

  The officer scribbled down the name. “Birth date?”

  “March the first, 1899, sir.”

  The officer glanced up again. “Today’s your birthday?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Your eighteenth birthday?”

  Thomas pulled back his shoulders and lifted his chin. “Yes, sir. I wanted to join as soon as I was eligible.”

  The officer’s eyes narrowed. Thomas fought the urge to look away from his scrutinizing stare.

  After a tense moment, the officer wrote down the date. “Occupation?”

  “Coal miner.”

  “Years in the mines?” the officer asked, his voice deflated by the monotony of his questions.

  “Eight.”

  The officer raised an eyebrow above his bifocals. “Eight?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “What type of work do you do in the mines?”

  “Demolition, sir.” Thomas had watched his dad and brother handle explosives in the mine enough to know the basics.

  If the officer questioned him further, he was confident he could bluff his way through the answers, but when the boy leaning against the statue chuckled and muttered, “Sure you did,” Thomas flushed Union Jack red from his hairline to his collar.

  “You handled explosives in the mines?” the officer asked, no longer attempting to disguise his disbelief.

  Before Thomas could answer, a frigid wind snaked through the square, scattering the officer’s papers. Thomas scrambled after them, fetching each page before returning to the table.

  “Thank you.” The officer took the papers and shuffled them into an orderly pile. “Your enthusiasm to serve is admirable, son,” he said, pushing his bifocals back up the bridge of his long, slender nose. “If we’re still at war in five years, come see me, but I’m afraid there’s no place for you in the army right now.”

  Thomas leaned over the table, so no one, especially the nosy ginger, would hear him beg. “Please, sir, I know I’m small for my age, but I’m a hard worker. Just give me a chance. I won’t let you down, sir. I promise.”

  The officer capped his fountain pen and laced his fingers. “I’m sorry, but I’m afraid you just don’t measure up to the standards the British Army demands of its soldiers. You’d do well to hurry back home, son. I have no doubt your mother is worried.”

  Fear and desperation squeezed Thomas’s throat, cracking his voice, but he no longer cared who heard. “Please, sir. I have to get to the Western Front. It’s a matter of life and death.”

  The officer sat back and picked up his pen. “Yes, it is.” And then he pointed left.

  THREE

  THE MAN ON Dorset Street had promised George two shillings if he brought him recruits with mining experience. When George spotted the boy in line at Trafalgar Square—Timothy, he’d heard him say—he knew he’d found a mark. Coal dust clung to the boy like a second skin and tinted his blond hair a dingy gray.

  George would have bet on his mother’s life that the small lad was no older than thirteen—that is, he would have if he had a mother whose life he could bet on … or a father, for that matter. But George only had his life, and according to every adult he’d ever met, it held no value worth wagering.

  He’d detected in the boy’s speech a Kentish accent, but beneath it, there were remnants of an Irish brogue. Either way, the lad was far from home, a fact George would use to his advantage.

  As the hours had dragged on, George had considered approaching the young recruit in line, but he knew the boy would never leave if he still held hope the army would accept him, so George decided to wait until the boy was rejected, desperate, and vulnerable.

  Watching his mark pace around the square, his head bowed and chin trembling, George almost felt sorry for the lad, but hunger and the damp cold of March kept any tug of pity from swaying him. Two shillings would buy him a hot meal, his first in nine days, so when the dispersing crowd swept the young miner onto the city streets, George followed. As he dodged between carts and motorcars, stalking the boy, his belly warmed with the thought of Mrs. Wellington’s mutton broth, potato pie, and duff, that steaming, fragrant pudding with its soft bits of plums and apples, but then a brisk evening breeze cut through George’s threadbare coat, and he reconsidered his plan. A hot meal would keep him warm only as long as it took to eat, but a good night’s sleep, indoors, under the covers of an actual bed …

  George sighed at the thought, deciding instead to rent a room in Mrs. Mahoney’s boardinghouse for the night. But first, he had to earn the shillings.

  * * *

  Distracted by thoughts of his latest failure, Thomas shuffled behind the crowd until, one by one, people peeled off from the mob and there was no longer a crowd to follow. He’d assumed the people he’d followed out of Trafalgar Square had been headed to Charing Cross, but when he looked around for signs of the train station, he didn’t recognize any of the buildings lining the unfamiliar street. The sun had retreated behind a row of tall tenements, siphoning the buildings and their inhabitants of color and warmth.

  Thomas stopped, uncertain how far he’d walked from Trafalgar Square. He entered a shop to ask for help and directions back to Charing Cross, where he prayed a kind soul would give him enough money to cover his fare home to Dover. Seconds later, a clerk’s angry voice chased him back onto the street. “If you’re looking for charity, find a church!”

  Thomas sat outside the shop and yanked the boots from his feet. Hot tears burned behind his eyes as he pulled the wads of damp cloth from his boots and tossed them in the sewer. He needed to find somewhere safe to wait until morning. His mum had warned him of the crimes committed on the streets of London in the light of day. He didn’t wish to be a witness to the criminals plying their shameful trade in the dark of night, or worse yet, become their victim.

  Wiping his nose on his sleeve, he stood and started back the way he’d come. He hoped to retrace his steps to Trafalgar Square and then to Charing Cross station, but as he passed the shop door, cold dread spilled down his spine, stopping him in his tracks. At the end of the block stood the street urchin from Trafalgar Square, smoking a cig
arette. He smiled at Thomas and waved.

  Thomas stumbled back, nearly knocking over the old shop clerk in his escape. He tried to apologize, but the clerk raised a hand to deliver a cuff to the side of Thomas’s head. Thomas ducked the strike and ran. When he came to the next corner, he sprinted down an alley, determined to lose his stalker once and for all.

  * * *

  George stubbed out his cigarette and strolled down the block and past an alleyway to the next street, where he hopped over a small crater in the road and stepped around broken bricks, shards of glass, and splintered wooden beams that had once stood as the front wall of a pub. A German zeppelin had changed that months earlier. Three men, including the owner, had died in the London bombing. The wreckage served as a stark reminder that the battlefields did not wholly contain this war and soldiers weren’t its only victims.

  The memory of the bombing yanked George’s gaze skyward. He scoured the evening sky for Germany’s massive silver airships, but found only sweeps of gray clouds hanging over London like a sooty fog. Assured he was safe for the moment, he reclined against the door frame of a tenement building and waited.

  It took longer for the lad to appear than George expected, but George knew the streets of London and there was only one way out of that alley unless the boy backtracked. After several minutes, George started to worry that some other bloke had snatched up his mark, but finally the boy peeked out around the corner and George grabbed him by the back of his collar.

  The rejected recruit spun around, his fists and feet flailing, but George kept the boy’s punches and kicks at arm’s length. Unable to land a hit or break free, the boy clawed at his arm. “Let go of me! Help!”

  A cluster of women gossiping in a doorway across the street spared them a fleeting glance before returning to their conversation.

  “Help!” the boy screamed even louder, but this time no one looked their way.

  “I’m trying to help,” George said through clenched teeth as the boy’s fingernails drew blood on his forearm. “But you need to calm down.”

  “Let go!”

  “Fine, but first you have to promise you won’t run.”

  The boy stopped struggling.

  “Do I have your word?” George asked.

  The boy nodded, so George let go and reached into his shirt pocket. The boy scrambled back until his heels hit the brick wall of the tenement.

  “Relax,” George said, pulling out his last cigarette. He’d earned the pack loading cargo at the shipyard. His blistered hands stung from gripping the ropes all night, and his back, arms, and legs ached from the strain of lifting the crates. He rolled the cigarette between his sore fingers and then held it out to the boy. “Smoke?”

  The boy shook his head.

  “You’re not from around here, are you?” George asked, placing the cigarette behind his ear.

  The boy didn’t answer. George noticed him start to reach up to touch his throat, but then stop and jam his hands in his pockets, his large blue eyes never leaving George’s face.

  “I’m not going to hurt you,” George said. “I just want to have a little chat. If you don’t like what I’m selling, we’ll go our separate ways.”

  The boy’s eyes narrowed, but George forged on. “I overheard your conversation with the recruiting officer. I think you got a raw deal being turned away like you were. What do you want to go joining Kitchener’s Army for anyway?”

  No answer.

  “Come on, Timothy,” George said, leaning in closer. “Your secret’s safe with me.”

  * * *

  Thomas looked down at his worn boots. He was trapped. This con kept digging at him and was now poking around, trying to get at his secrets.

  Six months earlier, when James had told Thomas he planned to join the army, he’d made Thomas swear to tell no one, especially not their mum, until after he’d left for training. Thomas remembered the morning he’d stood on the Dover station platform fighting back tears as he waved goodbye to his brother. Before the train had pulled away, James had leaned out the window, mussed up Thomas’s hair one last time, and promised everything would be all right. Thomas hated that James had left them, but he’d kept his brother’s secret. When his dad had discovered the truth, he gave Thomas a swatting he would not soon forget.

  “A secret can be a friend or a weapon, Thomas,” his mum had warned. “Take care how you use it.” And then she’d gone into her room and cried. Thomas’s backside had stung from his dad’s lashing for hours, but the pain of betrayal in his mum’s teary eyes still ached in his heart.

  Thomas thought about the secret he now kept. His lies hadn’t worked with the recruiter. They’d cost him his last chance to find his brother and return him home to his family. It was over. He’d failed his parents again. His secret no longer mattered. It was not his friend or his weapon, but aside from a photograph he’d taken from home, the medals around his neck, and the potato in his pocket, his secret was all he had left. He wouldn’t lose that too, not to a lying street urchin.

  “Don’t tell me you’re one of those boys who wants to go fight so he can feel like a real man,” the nosy boy pressed.

  “No,” Thomas said, kicking at a loose pebble on the cobblestone street. “I need the money.”

  “You and me both. See, we already have something in common. So tell me, Timothy Bennett.” He said the name through a knowing smile, hitting each t with sharp enunciation, as though he and Thomas shared an inside joke. “What’s your real name?”

  Thomas glanced over his shoulder, afraid someone might overhear their conversation, but the boy waved away his concern. “You could call yourself Dorothy around here. No one’s gonna bat an eye.”

  Thomas’s lips pressed into a hard line.

  “Fine. Timothy it is.” The boy pulled the cigarette from behind his ear and held it between his lips as he looked Thomas up and down. “Tiny Tim.” He chuckled at his joke.

  Thomas didn’t. “Don’t call me that.”

  “Tiny or Tim?”

  “Either.”

  “Then what should I call you?”

  “Thomas.”

  “Any last name, Thomas?”

  “Sullivan.”

  The street urchin held out his hand. “Good to meet you, Thomas Sullivan. Name’s George.”

  Thomas stared at George, waiting for him to finish his introduction.

  “No last name. Just George.”

  When Thomas didn’t take his hand, George rested it on Thomas’s shoulder. “So Thomas Sullivan, I have a proposition for you.”

  “A propo—”

  “—sition,” George said. “You know, an offer. I get something I want. You get something you want. Everyone’s happy.” He leaned forward and placed his hand against the wall behind Thomas’s head. “All you have to do is come with me.”

  Thomas ducked under his arm. “No thanks.”

  “You haven’t heard what I have to offer.”

  “I’ve heard enough,” Thomas said, walking faster, “and I’m not interested in your kind of help.”

  George strolled alongside him. “You sure about that, Tommy?”

  Thomas broke into a run. No one called him Tommy except his brother, but he had neither the time nor the patience to explain that to George. Distracted by his annoying shadow, he took a left when he should have cut right. Skidding to a halt, he stared at a brick wall at the end of a short alleyway. Cursing under his breath, he spun around and slammed into George.

  “You look lost,” George said. “Sure you can’t use my help?”

  “Positive,” Thomas said, pushing past him.

  George easily kept pace. “What’s the hurry, Tommy? Where you headed?”

  “Home.”

  George reached into his pocket. “Tough to buy a train ticket with no money unless, of course, you were planning to sell this.”

  Thomas stopped. His eyes widened with shock at the medals dangling from the necklace held between George’s fingers. He reached up and felt ar
ound his bare neck. “Where did you—? How—? When?”

  George shrugged. “Just one of my many talents.”

  The surprise in Thomas’s eyes hardened into anger. He lunged for the necklace, but George pulled it out of reach.

  “They don’t look to be worth much,” he said, inspecting the medals.

  “Don’t touch those!” Thomas screamed.

  George spit on his thumb and worked the saliva in small circles into the raised, tarnished surface of Saint Joseph. “Religious, eh? Well, your prayers have been answered, Thomas Sullivan. Think of me as your guardian angel.”

  “That’s my brother’s! Give it back!” Thomas jumped for the necklace, but George lifted it higher.

  “Only if you listen to my proposition.”

  “I don’t want to listen to anything you have to say, you lyin’ thief!”

  George shook his head. “That hurts, Tommy, and here I thought we were becoming mates.”

  “I’d never be mates with someone like you. Now give me my necklace or I’ll scream.”

  George spotted a bobby rounding the corner. He’d had run-ins with the handlebar-mustached cop many times over the years and couldn’t afford to have another today. He had an appointment to keep. Pulling his cap lower, he held out the necklace. “I was just trying to help.”

  Thomas grabbed it. “I don’t need help from the likes of you.” Securing the chain around his neck, he hurried in the direction he hoped would lead him back to Trafalgar Square.

  “My mistake,” George yelled after him as he lit his last cigarette. “I thought you needed to get to the Western Front.”

  Thomas stopped, and George smiled.

  FOUR

  TWO WEEKS AFTER he’d arrived in London, Thomas finally made his way back to Charing Cross train station, this time at a full sprint.

  He struggled to keep pace with George running ahead of him, but the mustached bobby with the truncheon charging after them kept Thomas pushing through the hitch in his side. The army uniform he wore did little to help his progress. Two sizes too big and three inches too long, it tripped up his every step. Gripping his waistband with one hand and his army kit bag with the other, Thomas hiked up his trousers and hurried to catch George.