Orphans of War

by Leah Fleming

  The bowling green at the back had been turned into an allotment with a shelter hidden away in a pit with turf over the corrugated roof. It was damp and smelly but Maddy felt safe in there.

  Maddy had her own bedroom in the eaves of the thatched pub. They were close to a new RAF aerodrome, and men from the station came crowding into the bar, singing and fooling around until all hours. It was a war-free cocoon of smoke and noise and rowdy games. She wasn’t allowed in the bar but sometimes she caught a glimpse of the pilots jumping over the chairs and leapfrogging over one another. It looked like PE in the playground.

  She often counted the planes out and in during the small hours when the noise of bombs in the distance kept her awake. They’d heard about the terrible fires over London and listened to the ack-ack guns blasting into the night sky to protect Liverpool and Manchester from raiders. She wished her parents were back in the country entertaining the troops and factory workers close by, not out of reach on the other side of the world and their letters coming all in a rush.

  She was glad her parents were together but it seemed years since they had been a proper family and most of that time they’d all lived out of a theatrical trunk. No wonder she balked at leaving the only place she called home, to be evacuated. That was why she’d pushed her luck in class, even though she was on her final warning

  Being small, though, meant she felt useless–too young to help in the bar, too old for silly games–sand not sure when she’d be old enough to join up and do something herself. There had to be something she could do besides look after Bertie, the cocker spaniel.

  When her chores were done Maddy raced to the apple tree at the far end of the field. It was stripped of fruit and the leaves were curling up. It was her lookout post where she did plane spotting. She could tell the Jerries’ from the Spitfires blindfolded by now. The enemy planes had a slow throb, throb on its engine but the home planes were one continuous drone. She liked to watch the planes taking off from the distant runway and dreamed of flying off across the world to see Mummy and Daddy. It wasn’t fair. They had each other and she had no one.

  Granny was OK, in a bossy no-nonsense sort of way, but she was always hovering behind her, making her do boring prep and home reading. It wasn’t as if Maddy planned anything naughty, it just sort of happened–like last week in assembly in the parish church when she sat behind Sandra Bowles.

  Sandra had the thickest long ropes of plaits reaching down to her waist and she was always tossing them over her shoulder to show how thick and glossy they were. Her ribbons were crisp and made of gold satin to match the stripes on their blazers.

  Maddy’s own plaits were weedy little wiry things because she had curly black hair that didn’t grow very fast and it was a struggle to stop bits spilling out.

  Sandy was showing off as usual, and Maddy couldn’t resist clasping the two ropes in a vice grip as they dangled into her thick hymn book, so that when they all rose to sing ‘Lord dismiss us with thy blessing’, Sandra yelped and her head was yanked back.

  Maddy didn’t know where to hide her satisfaction, but Miss Connaught saw the dirty deed and it was the last straw after a list of detentions and lines. Nobody listened to her side of the tale–how she’d been the object of Sandra’s tormenting for months. No, she would not miss St Hilda’s one bit.

  It wasn’t her fault she was born with a funny eye that didn’t follow her other. Mummy explained that she must wait until she was older and fully grown before the surgeon would be able to correct it properly but that was years away. There’d been one operation when she was younger but it hadn’t worked. Being pretty in the first place would have helped but when Mummy looked at her she always sighed and said she must come from the horsy side of the Belfield family, being good at sport, with long legs.

  They never talked much about Daddy’s family, the Belfields, and never visited them. They lived in Yorkshire somewhere. There were no cards or presents exchanged at Christmas either.

  Daddy met Mummy when he was recovering after the Great War and she was a singer and dancer in a troupe. He was musical too and spent hours playing the piano in the hospital. They’d fallen in love when Mummy went to sing to them. It was all very romantic.

  Maddy’s first memories were of singing and laughter and dancing when they visited Granny and Grandpa’s pub near Preston. She’d stayed with them when the Bellaires were on tour. Grandpa died and Granny came to work with George when Auntie Kath ran away with the cellar man.

  Now everything was changed because of this war and everyone was on the move here and there. She just wanted to sit in the tree with Bertie, the cocker spaniel, sitting guard at the base. He was her best friend and keeper of all her secrets.

  When it was getting dusk it was time to do her evening chores, closing curtains and making sure that Bertie and the hens got fed for the evening. Now that she’d been expelled, Maddy wasn’t so sure about going to a new school after all. What if it was worse than St Hilda’s?

  ‘Go and get us some fish and chips,’ yelled Granny from the doorway. ‘I’m too whacked to make tea tonight. The books are making my eyes ache. Here’s my purse. The one in Entwistle Street will be open tonight. And no vinegar on mine…’

  Maddy jumped down and shot off for her mac. There was no time to call Bertie in from the field. Fish and chips were always a treat. St Hilda’s would call them ‘common’ but she didn’t care.

  She heard Moaning Minnie, the siren, cranking up the air-raid warning as the queue for fish and chips shuffled slowly through the door. Maddy looked up at the night sky, leaning on the gleaming chrome and black and green façade of the fish bar.

  Outside, little torches flickered in an arc of light on the pavements as people scurried by.

  ‘Looks as if Manchester is getting another pasting tonight!’ sighed an old man as he sprinkled salt all over his battered fish.

  ‘Go easy with that, Stan. There’s a war on,’ shouted the fish fryer.

  Maddy could feel her stomach rumbling. The smell of the batter, salt and pea broth was tempting. This was a rare treat as Gran liked to cook her own dishes. If only the sirens would stop screaming.

  Chadley was getting off lightly in the recent air raids as there was nothing but a few mills and shops and an aviation supply factory. The Jerries preferred the docks. As she looked up into the sky she saw dark droning shapes and knew she’d have to find shelter–but not before she got their supper wrapped in newspaper. There was something brave about queuing in an air raid.

  Gran would be getting herself down to ‘The Pit’, and Uncle George would be sorting out all the air-raid precautions before he went down to the cellar.

  When she was fed up Maddy liked to hide with Bertie in the Anderson shelter away from everyone, and sulk. She knew four big swear words: Bugger, Blast, Damnation and Shit, and could say them all out loud there and not get told off. There was another she’d heard but not even dared speak it aloud in case it brought doom on her head.

  The whistle was blasting in her ears as she clutched her parcel, making for home, when an arm pulled her roughly into a doorway.

  ‘Madeleine Belfield, get yourself under cover. Can’t you see the bombs are dropping!’ shouted Mr Pye, the Air-Raid Warden as he dragged her down the steps to a makeshift communal shelter in a basement. She could just make out a clutch of women and children crouching down, clutching cats and budgies in cages, and she wished she’d brought Bertie on his lead. The planes were getting closer and closer to the airfield. This was a real raid, not a pretend one.

  Last year it was quiet, nothing much had happened, but since the summer, night after night the raiders came. Her school, once thought far enough out to be safe, was now in the firing line, which was why the pupils were being rushed away to a house in the deepest country.

  Perhaps she ought to go and apologise to Miss Connaught and promise to be well behaved…perhaps not. The thought of sharing a dorm with Sandra Bowles and her pinching cronies filled her with horror.

>   Oh Bertie…Where was her bloody dog! Now she’d thought about the terrible word.

  It seemed ages sitting, waiting, the smell of damp and cigarette smoke up her nose. She wished she was down in the cellar with Uncle George.

  Uncle George always smiled and said, ‘At least we won’t die of thirst down there, folks,’ coming out with his usual joke before he went into the night-time routine of turning off gas and water taps, evacuating the first few thirsty customers outside, across the bowling green to the official Anderson shelter they called ‘The Pit’. He would be checking that the stirrup pumps were ready for any incendiaries. They all had the drill off pat by now. Everyone had a job.

  Now the sirens were screaming, distracting Maddy.

  ‘They’re early tonight,’ said old Mr Godber, sitting across on the bench with a miserable face. He was one of the regulars who usually came early to The Feathers for his cup of tea and a two penny ‘nip’, but now he was tucking into his chips with relish. There was old Lily who came in for jugs of stout and who once whispered that she’d been stolen by gypsies in the night but Maddy didn’t believe her. There was Mrs Cooper from the bakery, and her three little children trailing blankets and teddies, one of them was plugged into a rubber dummy. He kept staring at Maddy’s eye patch and her bag of chips with longing. There was the wife of the fish-and-chip man, and two old men Maddy didn’t know, who filled the small place with tobacco from their pipes. It was such a smelly crush in the shelter.

  ‘Where’s yer little dog?’ said Lily. The racket was getting louder. ‘If she’s got any sense she’ll’ve run a mile away from this hellhole. Dogs can sense danger…Don’t fret, love, she’ll be safe.’

  ‘But he doesn’t like Moaning Minnie.’ Maddy wanted to cry, and clutched the warm newspaper to her, looking anxious. She hoped Gran had taken her hat box down there. It contained her jewellery, their documents, her insurance certificates and the licences, and their identity papers, and it was Maddy’s job to make sure it got put in a safe place. Tonight the box would have to stay under the bed and take its chance.

  The sky was still humming with droning black insects hovering ahead. There was a harvest moon tonight, torching the bombers’ path through the dark sky, just the night for Liverpool to be the target. There were planks on the basement floor but it was still claggy and damp, smelling of must.

  ‘Maddy! Thank goodness you’re here! Good girl, to stay put in the High Street shelter.’ Down the steps came Ivy Sangster, all of a do. ‘Yer Gran was worried so she sent me out to look for you. I said I’d keep you company down here,’ said the barmaid, who helped them on busy nights. ‘I’m glad I found you,’ she said, plonking herself down with a flask. ‘You’d better eat your chips before they go cold.’

  ‘Did they bring in Bertie? Is he in the cellar?’

  ‘Not sure, love. Your uncle George’s gone down as usual. You know he can’t stand small spaces…not since the trench collapsed on him,’ whispered Ivy, who was very fond of her boss and blushed every time he spoke to her. ‘Yer gran says it hurts her back bending in the Anderson. They’ll be fine down in the cellar.’

  They all squatted on benches either side, waiting for the all clear, but the racket outside just got worse. Maddy was trembling at the noise but clung on to her chips. Ivy ferreted for her mouth organ to pass the time. They always had a singsong to drown out the bangs.

  None of them felt like singing this time, though. Maddy started to whimper, ‘I don’t like it!’

  It hadn’t been this bad for ages. Maddy was glad it wasn’t opening time and the pub was crowded or the shelter would be squashed. It would soon be over and they could go home and heat up the supper.

  It was dark in the basement shelter so when someone flashed a torch Maddy inspected the walls for spiders and creepy crawlies to put in her matchbox zoo. Everyone was trying to put on cheery faces for her but she could see they were worried and nervous. They were the ‘We can take it’ faces that smiled on a poster at the bus station.

  She tried to distract herself by thinking of good memories. When her parents were ‘resting’ between jobs, Mummy was all of a dazzle behind the bar, with her hair piled up in curls, earrings dangling and a blouse that showed off her magnificent bust, wearing just enough pan stick and lipstick to look cheerful even when she was tired. The aircrews flocked to her end of the bar while Daddy played tunes on the piano. Sometimes Maddy was allowed to peep through the door and watch Mummy singing.

  Mummy’s voice had three volumes: piano, forte, and bellow–what she called her front stalls, gallery and the gods. When she started up everyone fell silent until she let them join in the choruses. Every bar night was a performance and the regulars loved her. Daddy just pulled the pints and smiled as the till rang. He sometimes sat down and played alongside her. Singing was thirsty work and good for The Feathers.

  ‘I want my mummy,’ whimpered Maddy. ‘She always comes and sings to me. I don’t like it in here any more.’

  ‘I know, love, but it won’t be long now,’ said Ivy smiling.

  ‘I want her now and I want Daddy. It’s not fair…I want Bertie,’ she screamed, suddenly feeling very afraid.

  ‘Now then, nipper, don’t make a fuss. We can’t work miracles. It won’t be long now. Let’s have some of your chips. Sing and eat and take no notice, that’s the way to show Hitler who’s boss,’ said Mr Godber. ‘Eat your chips.’

  ‘I’m not hungry. Why are they making such big bangs?’

  ‘I don’t know. It must be the airfield they’re after tonight,’ he said, shrugging his shoulders.

  The whiz-bangs were the closest to them for a long time and Maddy was trembling. She felt suffocated with all these strangers. What if they had a direct hit? What about their neighbours down the road? Were they all quaking in their shoes too?

  Was the whole of Chadley trembling at this pounding? They huddled together, listening to every explosion, and then it fell quiet and Maddy wanted to rush out and breathe the clean air.

  ‘I’ll just open up and see what’s what,’ said the warden. ‘They’re passing over. The all clear’ll be sounding soon. Perhaps we’ll get a night’s kip in our own beds, for a change,’ he laughed, opening the curtain and the door.

  Maddy felt the whoosh of hot air as soon as the door was opened, a flash of light and a terrific bang. It was like daylight outside.

  ‘What’s that noise and that fire? Oh Gawd, that was close! Stay back!’ the warden screamed.

  Then the droning ceased, and when the all clear sounded everyone cheered.

  Ivy and Maddy stumbled out into the darkness, hands clutching each other for support.

  There were sounds of running feet and a strange heat and light, crackling and whistling, bells going off. Men were shouting orders. As they left Entwistle Street for the main road, lined with familiar houses and shops, the light got brighter and the smoke was blinding, the smells of cordite and burning rubber choking Maddy’s nostrils. As they turned towards home they saw everything was ablaze, houses gaped open, the rubble alive with dark figures crawling over bricks, shouting.

  ‘No further, sorry, lass,’ said a voice.

  ‘But we live here,’ said Ivy. ‘The Feathers down there.’

  ‘No further, love. It took a direct hit. We’re still digging them out. Better get some tea.’

  That last bang had been The Feathers. Its timbers were alight, turning it into a roaring inferno. The heat of it seared their faces and Maddy began to shake. Granny and Uncle George were down in that cellar…

  ‘What’s going on? Why can’t we see The Feathers? We’ve got to get to them…My granny…Granny…Ivy, Mr Godber, do something!’

  She saw the looks on their stricken faces. No one could survive in that furnace, and Maddy sank back, terrified, feeling small and helpless and stunned by the inferno. She began to sob and Ivy did her best to comfort her. They couldn’t do anything but watch the fire rage. Maddy felt sick at the sight of their home going up in smoke and the t
hought that the two best people in the world, who’d done no harm to anyone, were trapped in that fire.

  They all stumbled backwards, recoiling from the furnace before them. There were sounds of fire bells and shouting voices, more whistles blowing. She could hear someone shouting orders and the heat forced her back on her heels, the smoke blinding her, choking her throat with the smell of burning wood like some giant bonfire. The stench was making her feel sick.

  The pub was ablaze from end to end. There were fires raging across the road. The garage exploded as the oil caught fire, sending fumes into the air. All she could think about was poor Granny and Uncle George as Ivy rushed forward screaming. ‘Two of them in the cellar…George and Millie Mills! They’re inside in the cellar…There’s a trap door. Oh God! Get them out, please!’ Her voice was squeaky.

  ‘Sorry, miss, no further, not near the fire. We’ve got to get it under control. Just the two of you outside then?’

  ‘I only went to Entwistle Street for chips, see, for their supper…I live here.’ Maddy pointed to the fire, not understanding.

  ‘Not now you don’t, love. All that timber and thatch, gone up like tinder. I’m sorry. We’re digging them out across the road. It’s not safe if the petrol tank goes up…The airfield got it bad tonight,’ said the blackened-faced fireman, trying to be kind, but she didn’t want to hear his words.

  Another man in uniform was talking to a woman in a uniform.

  ‘Two survivors for you, Mavis,’ he said, pointing them out. ‘Take them for some tea.’

  ‘We’ve had our supper, thank you,’ Maddy said. ‘What about my dog, Bertie? You’ve got to look for him too.’

  ‘Bertie’ll be fine, love. Let the men get on with their jobs. I don’t think he went in the cellar. He’ll be hiding until it’s safe. We can look for him later,’ Ivy offered, putting her arm round her, but Maddy shook it off. She must find Bertie.