‘Should I call you Daddy?’ His smile widened:
‘Only if yeh want teh, Ginny. Moikey called me Mr Baker, at fust – mebbe that’d be easier fer yew, too?’ The little girl contemplated this, her head tilted on one side; he found himself looking into bright blue eyes which held his, thoughtfully:
‘Okay – That’d be best, I think. ’Til I get to know you.’ He nodded, looked up at Michael:
‘We’d better git goin’, boy, we’ve lost days a’ready!’ Michael gave him a grin:
‘I’ll go ’n start the engine, shall Oi?’
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Through that Spring and early Summer of 1942, there were times, many of them, when Albert began to regret the hastily-conceived conspiracy which had led him to be the custodian of Michael’s younger sister. He got on well enough with the child herself, even if she remained for a long time quite shy of him, unsure of exactly how to treat him. And the presence of an eight-year-old girl in his crew caused him no direct qualms – Gracie was only too delighted to have the domestic charge of her, relishing her acquisition of a little sister after so many brothers.
Ginny herself, however, didn’t seem to settle. Unlike her brother, who had almost gleefully grasped the unfamiliar life of a boater after escaping from the household and habits he had come to hate, she had been torn from a settled, loving home in the most painful way possible. She continued to mourn for her mother and her handicapped brother, and found the sudden, dramatic change in her lifestyle very difficult to cope with. Young boys are rather less concerned with such minor conveniences as a bathroom, or a flush toilet – little girls, however, are inclined to enjoy such luxuries, and miss them if they are abruptly withdrawn. Having to manage with a strip-wash in the cabin, with a hand-bowl of warm water and a sponge, came as something of a shock; and she treated the bucket in the engine-hole with undisguised horror.
To find herself suddenly sharing a space six feet by eight, with a girl in her late teens, also gave her pause for thought. She had had to share with her mother in their grandparents’ house, but that had been a moderate-sized room, and even though Gracie made a huge fuss of her, quickly settling into her role as big sister, she found the close confines rather oppressive: ‘Gracie’s lovely, and she doesn’t mind, but there’s no room!’
At first, Michael eagerly adopted the role that Stevie had played for him, on his first trips, becoming a teacher to her as well as big brother. She tried very hard to learn, to do all the jobs she could manage which were a part of the working boat trade – to begin with, she tired easily, but soon began to develop the same wiry tenacity that had so endeared Michael to Bill and Vi Hanney. In the locks, she would work with him, doing what she could alone and appealing for his help when a paddle proved too stiff for her, or a gate too heavy to move; she quickly showed a dexterity with the ropes which had Albert grinning with delight, and a sure-footedness about the boats the equal of many born-and-bred boat children.
But within herself, she remained unsettled, her happiness at being reunited with one brother tempered by her ongoing pain at the absence of both her mother and her other brother. To Albert, and to Michael, she seemed withdrawn, almost unhappy; only with Gracie did she relax, only to her could she talk openly about her loneliness without her mother. And, it seemed, only the older girl could comfort her, make her smile freely.
Michael found her reticence upsetting – after their joyful meeting, her aloofness from him, except when they were working, began to play on his mind, making him think he was to blame for it. And, truth to tell, he had his own difficulties. On top of the sorrow of his mother’s and Andy’s deaths, he couldn’t rid himself of feelings of guilt – guilt that he had delayed so long over getting in touch with them, guilt, especially, that he had made no effort to see them, that he had never seen his brother again after walking out on that fateful night, that he had only met his mother on her deathbed. If only…
With so much preying on his mind, it is perhaps not surprising that Albert began to find his new son also becoming withdrawn, almost sullen. He tried to jolly him out of his dark moods, using the kind of banter which had always in the past got the boy laughing, but was lucky now to elicit a weak smile. He’d even tried a new jest, only to be rebuffed with an aggression he hadn’t seen in Michael before: Setting away from the top of Camp Hill locks, heading out of Birmingham towards Warwick, he’d handed the tiller over:
‘Ther’ yeh go, Mr Thompson, she’s all yers!’
‘Don’t call me that! My name’s Baker, now, don’t ever call me that!’ Michael had grabbed the tiller from him, staring straight ahead in furious silence. Albert stood on the gunwale, took out his pipe and filled it slowly, lit it. Then he looked back at the boy, saw the pain in his face, and reached out to put a hand on his shoulder, only to have Michael shrug him off. But then he glanced around, and their eyes met:
‘Oi’m sorry, boy, Oi didn’t mean ter hurt yeh.’ Michael shook his head, gave him the first real smile he’d seen in weeks:
‘I know yeh didn’t Dad. Sorry I shouted, but…’ Albert saw the brightness of tears in his eyes, replaced the hand on his shoulder:
‘Things’ll work out, son, yew see if Oi’m not roight. Give it toime, eh?’ Michael nodded; and then the tears were spilling down his cheeks. Albert moved closer, slipped his arm around his shoulders and gave a quick squeeze before walking around to the engine-hole and disappearing into it to allow the boy his privacy. Once out of sight, he heaved a sigh of frustrated sympathy.
Given the turmoil in his mind, perhaps it was no surprise that Michael’s patience with his sister often balanced on a knife-edge. He had appointed himself her chief instructor, only allowing Gracie to take charge of her on the butty, showing her how to handle the boat itself, the tricks and knacks of living in a confined space; in other things, she would do her best to follow his teaching, but her small physique and lack of experience would frequently let her down. And it was at these moments that he would all too often snap or snarl at her, pushing her aside to do the job himself with an expression of impatient annoyance on his face.
She took this, not allowing her feelings to show in front of him; but Gracie would find her crying quietly in the cabin, try to comfort her without knowing the cause, assuming it was her continuing anguish at the death of her mother which was the source of her pain. It was Albert who had noticed the way he would let his anger show, who had been tempted several times to intervene, but then refrained, afraid of making the schism worse.
As if to reflect the fraught, tense atmosphere on Albert’s boats, the news from afar was universally depressing during that Spring. The battle of the Atlantic was being lost in spectacular fashion, the wolf-packs sinking allied shipping faster than even the shipyards of America could replace it. A new offensive in Southern Russia had the German army pushing quickly, and apparently easily, to the gates of Stalingrad, with the oilfields of the Caucasus eagerly in sight; and in North Africa, Rommel’s divisions had fought back again, and looked to be well on their way to the Nile.
* * *
They were heading North, loaded with bagged sugar again, for Fazeley Street Wharf. It had been a trying day; blustery showers appearing with a suddenness which had them diving for their coats at frequent intervals, and a hold-up for a displaced paddle-board which had lost them more than an hour. Tempers, if not exactly frayed, were at least a little worn.
‘We’ll toy at Fishery, Moikey.’
‘Roight y’are Dad.’ Michael handed the motor’s tiller over to Albert as they came past Boxmoor, went forward ready to snatch the fore-ends together as they tied; on the butty, Ginny did the same, preparatory to taking the line off to tie off to the bank. Albert slowed the motor almost to a standstill, as Gracie slid the butty along his inside; he coiled in the seventy-foot snubber, then took the breasting string from her, dropped it over the dolly, bringing the sterns together. Michael dropped the fore-end line off the motor over the butty’s t-stud, hauled the bows together,
tied them off. Ginny took the butty’s line, stepped off onto the bank; but she missed her footing, fell forward as one foot slipped into the water, landing heavily and grazing her knee quite badly.
‘Ginny!’ Far from sympathetic, Michael’s shout was one of anger. He stepped over, across the butty and down beside her, snatched the rope from her hands and pulled the boats in: ‘Can’t you even get off without messing things up?’
She picked herself up, biting her lip to hold back the tears, brushed her pinafore down and ran to the other end of the boat and climbed aboard, ignoring Gracie’s startled question. The older girl followed her down into the cabin, repeated her words:
‘Ginny – yew all roight?’ This time she got an answer:
‘I fell over and hurt my knee.’ She lifted the hem of her dress, showed her the scrape, the blood beginning to trickle down her shin.
‘Coom ’ere, loovey.’ Gracie sat beside her, reached for a scrap of clean cloth from the soap-hole in the back wall of the cabin, set about cleaning the wound. When she was satisfied, she asked:
‘That better, Ginny?’ The little girl nodded:
‘Thank you, Gracie.’ Her own anger surfaced: ‘I could’ve broken it, for all he cares!’
‘Oh, Ginny! He doon’t mean it – we’ve all ’ad a rough day.’
‘Yes he does! He’s always shouting at me…’ Gracie put an arm around her, pulled her gently into an embrace, shushing her at the same time as looking up to meet Albert’s eyes, where he had leant over to see if everything was all right. The glances they exchanged were significant, expressing their mutual despair at the tension between brother and sister.
Chapter Thirty
It was quite late. They had eaten on the move, as they did so often; minutes after they had tied up, Joey Caplin arrived, having cycled from Berkhamsted where he had left Bognor and Bodmin, in the hope of finding them, knowing they should be somewhere along that length:
‘Yew coomin’ over the Fishery, Gracie?’
‘Is it okay, Ooncle Alby?’ She asked. He smiled his understanding:
‘Yew go on, girl! Oi’ll be along in a whoile.’
The two departed hand in hand; Albert ducked down into the motor cabin, slipped on the tidier of his two jackets, picked up his old trilby and stuck it on his head.
‘Can Oi coom, Dad?’ Albert gave Michael a stern look:
‘Yew’d be better off ’avin’ a word or two wi’ yer sister, boy.’
‘I’ll talk to her tomorrow, okay?’
‘No! Yew stay ’ere, boy, sort out yer diff’rences. Oi’m sick ’n toired of ’earin’ yeh snappin’ at ’er.’
Their life, like their work, was usually carried on in easy companionship. Now, Albert’s firm line gave Michael pause – and he knew better than to argue any further. As the boatman stepped off, made his way over the bridge to the pub, he screwed down his courage and stepped down into the butty cabin.
‘Ginny?’ She looked up, her cheeks still wet:
‘What do you want?’
‘Can I talk to you?’
‘I s’pose – if you want to!’ Ignoring her discouraging tone, he sat next to her:
‘Ginny…’ He found himself lost for words. But she wasn’t – her own anger flashed to the surface again:
‘You sound just like him!’ This left Michael stumped:
‘What? Who?’
‘Daddy! When you get angry, and shout at me, you sound just like him!’
‘What?’
‘When he used to get angry, and shout at Mummy! You’re just like him!’
‘No!’ Her words stung a furious, frightened response from him: ‘You’re wrong – I’m not like him at all!’
‘Yes you are! You ought to hear yourself!’
‘No-o…!’ Now the word was a prayer rather than a denial.
‘I wish Mummy was here! I wish she hadn’t died, so I could go home again!’
‘Oh, Ginny – I miss her too.’
‘Not like me!’
‘Yes I do – she was my Mum as well! I loved her just like you!’
‘Huh!’ There was a depth of scorn in her voice: ‘You didn’t even come and see us, did you? You hadn’t seen her for ages and ages!’
‘Ginny…’ Her name became a supplication; her words piled on top of the guilt and remorse already weighing on his mind, and the total was more than he could bear. He turned away from her, bowed his head and, elbows on his knees, buried his face in his hands: I can’t give in – I’m not going to cry…
Ginny stared at him for a moment, his sudden collapse taking her by surprise; then, realising if not fully understanding his pain, she hotched nearer to him, slipped an arm around his waist, felt the trembling of his body, the heaving of his shoulders, heard the sound of his sobbing through the muffling of his hands:
‘Mikey…?’ He lifted his face, gave her a thin smile – she’d never used what he thought of as his boater’s name before. There was a compassion in her eyes which pierced his heart, made his feelings of guilt surface with even greater force. He gave one more deep, heartfelt sob:
‘Don’t you see? That’s why I feel so rotten! I should have got in touch with you all much sooner – I should have come to see you! If I had – maybe things would have been different – maybe she wouldn’t have got sick, maybe Andy wouldn’t have either! I should never have run away and left you all!’
All the anger and resentment Ginny had felt evaporated in the face of his torment, to be replaced by love for her brother: ‘Oh, Michael!’ She hugged him even tighter; he sank his head to her slim shoulder, let his tears flow freely.
‘Mikey?’ He lifted his head; she looked into his wide, sad eyes: ‘Mummy knew. She understood, why you’d run away. She always said you were still alive, even when everyone else said you were dead. And then – she didn’t mind, ’cos you didn’t come and see us – she said, as long as you were all right, as long as you were happy, it didn’t matter, not really.’
‘Are you sure?’ He wanted, desperately, to believe her.
‘I’m sure, Mikey. I asked her, lots of times, why you didn’t come and see us. And that’s what she always said – it was enough to know you were all right. But – she was so pleased, that you came to see her, before she…’ Her own sorrow took over; now, it was his turn to hold her, comfort her:
‘You were there for her, all the time, Ginny. It’s more than I was.’ She nodded:
‘Yes, but – I went to see her, after you’d been – and she was so happy! I…’
‘Shhh-shhh! Don’t cry, Ginny.’
‘I… can’t help it…I still miss her…’
‘Me too…’
Brother and sister sat side by side, arms entwined, sharing their sadness and their love. Minutes, ages, passed; at last, Michael broke the emotional silence:
‘Ginny?’
‘Mm-hm?’
‘Things have changed, Ginny. We can’t go back, to how it was, ever.’ He felt her nod, her head still resting on his shoulder:
‘I know, Mikey.’
‘We’ve got a new Dad, now. And a new life… I’m sorry – if you’re not happy here…’ She raised her head, smiled at him:
‘I’m happy, Mikey. I thought, for a bit, you didn’t love me any more…’
‘I do, Ginny! More than ever, I promise. I’m sorry I ever shouted at you – I didn’t really mean to, it was only because I felt so bad…’
‘I know. But we’re all right now, aren’t we?’
‘We’re foine!’ She giggled, to hear him slip into the boater’s dialect which was becoming part of his day-to-day persona.
Albert had enjoyed a couple of beers with the small group of other boaters in the Fishery Inn. Cheerful and replete, he left Gracie and Joe to make their goodbyes, and headed back to the boats. There’d been no sign of Michael following him to the pub, which he’d half expected to happen – now, he was hoping that the boy and his sister had settled their differences.
Knocking on the cabinside
of the butty, he put his head in at the hatch, and chuckled to see brother and sister cuddled up together on the sidebed. Both looked up at him, their eyes shining:
‘All roight, Dad?’ He nodded.
‘Welcome back, Daddy!’ He stopped in surprise, gazed at the little girl’s happy smile; then he stepped down into the cabin, squeezed in beside her. She turned to him, threw her arms around his neck, kissed his cheek; he slipped his arm about her, held her tight. Michael reached across – their hands met, held, gripped in expression of the love which bound them.
Chapter Thirty-One
The remainder of that Summer, and the Autumn which followed, saw the four-handed crew of the Sycamore and the Antrim working and living together in a renewed harmony. With Ginny reconciled to the irrevocable change in her life, happy, now, to be with her brother, and Michael’s guilt and pain in some degree assuaged, they all found a new joy in their relationships. They found themselves, for much of that time, working around to Limehouse Dock to load, carrying foodstuffs, mostly tinned, which had arrived by coaster, on to the midlands. Their backloads to Brentford or City Road were usually war materials of one sort or another; occasionally bricks or building materials needed for urgent reconstruction of buildings damaged in the blitz.
Joey was making more and more opportunities, at the expense of cycling for miles along the towpaths at the end of his days’ labours, to see his Gracie, and the two of them were beginning to plan for their wedding the following Summer; their shared affection brought a paternal gleam to Albert’s eye, and a rather shy pleasure to the two youngsters.
And, as if inspired by such parochial events, the news from far afield was improving: Rommel’s thrust to occupy Egypt had run out of steam near a little village called El Alamein – after a couple of months of stalemate, during which the Allied forces were strengthened by convoys travelling via Malta, Montgomery’s counterattack had him in headlong retreat. And from Southern Russia, news was coming back that the Soviet army had penetrated the exposed flank of the German divisions besieging Stalingrad, and was threatening to trap them in a huge pincer movement.
A Boy Off the Bank Page 16