Weaver

by Baxter, Stephen

  On the Saturday morning she set off from her rented apartment in London in her hired Austin Seven, with its white-painted bumpers and plastic visors on the headlamps, to drive down to the coast.

  The drive ought to have been simple enough. Her plan was to head roughly south-south-east, passing through Croydon, Sevenoaks and Tunbridge Wells, before cutting through the Sussex countryside until she came to Hastings via a little place called Battle, where the English had once faced the Normans. That was the theory.

  But she never knew where the hell she was. Even as she drove she saw gangs of workmen cutting down direction markers, and unscrewing metal plates with village names. No names! She was a journalist and historian who had always made her living from words, and she thought how odd it was that to protect their country the English were stripping it of its words, of the layer of meaning that gave the landscape its human context: words that were a mish-mash of Norman French and Norse and Old English and even a bit of Latin, relics of other tumultuous days, words like bullet holes. Well, it might or might not confuse General Guderian and his Panzers, but it sure as hell confused Mary.

  Still, the sun was a beacon in the clear sky. She took her bearings from that and just kept on running south. It wasn’t that big a country, and she had to hit the coast in the end.

  And meanwhile this first day of June was exquisitely lovely, one of those early summer days that England served up so effortlessly. Over a crumpled green carpet of fields and hedgerows, the birds soared like Spitfires. It didn’t make sense, Mary thought. How could all this coexist with the horrors of the European war, unfolding just a few tens of miles away? Either the war wasn’t real, or the summer’s day wasn’t; they didn’t fit in the same universe.

  Once she was through the last of the inland towns and neared the coast, the signs of war became more evident. There were pillboxes at the road junctions, some of them so new you could see the concrete glisten, still wet. She was nervous every time she crossed a bridge, for the Home Guard were mining the bridges, Great War veterans and kids too young to be conscripted who might or might not know what they were doing with high explosives.

  And then, when she got close enough to glimpse the sea from the higher ground, she came upon more traffic. Most of it was heading the other way, inland, a steady stream of private cars, families, mum, dad, the kids, the dog and the budgie in its cage, with roof racks piled high with suitcases and even bits of furniture. Despite the official orders to ‘stay put’, as Mary had heard the new Prime Minister Churchill saying on the BBC, whole towns were draining northward, looking for safety. And in among the fleeing English were refugees who must come from much further away, buses and lorries full of civilians, women and children and old folk, and a sprinkling of men of military age. Jammed in, grimy, exhausted, they stared out at the glistening English landscape as they passed.

  At one crossroads there was a hold-up. An Army truck had thrown a tyre, and a couple of soldiers were labouring to replace it. The soldiers had stripped to their khaki shirts in the heat of the summer sun, and as they struggled with the heavy wheels they bantered and laughed, cigarettes dangling from their lips. The traffic had to inch past, the laden buses and trucks bumping up on the verge to get by.

  Mary found herself stuck opposite a bus that was marked for Bexhill and Boreham Street. She looked into the eyes of one little boy, who sat on the lap of a woman, presumably his mother. He was maybe eight or nine. His hair was mussed, and the dirt on his face was streaked by dried tears. He wore what looked like a school blazer, but the colour was odd - bright orange, not the English fashion. He said something, but she couldn’t make out his lip pattern. But then he could be speaking French, or Dutch, or Walloon - maybe even German. She mouthed back, ‘Welcome to England.’

  II

  At last she came to a coastal town. But which one?

  She tracked a rail line until she reached a small station. No name signs. A train stood here, evidently kept back for troops; somebody had chalked ‘WELCOME HOME BEF’ on the side of a wagon. It made sense that once you had the troops back you would rush them inland, away from the dangers of the coast. But there were no troops to be transported; the train stood idle.

  She got to a sea road and turned left, following the line of the coast. To her right the sea lay steel grey and calm, glimmering with highlights, studded with boats. The tide was low, and there was a beach of shingle and rocks, covered by tangles of wire and big concrete cubes. These coastal works were just the outer crust of an entire country turning into a fortress, with hundreds of miles of coastline reinforced, and elaborate systems of defences reaching far inland. The beach just ran on as far as she could see, curving gently into a bay ahead of her, to the east. Hastings had a harbour, but there was no harbour here; she wasn’t in Hastings.

  She wasn’t sure what to do. She’d driven non-stop from London. She was stiff and thirsty and, having had little sleep, was conking out.

  She parked the car roughly at the beach side of the road and clambered out. It was about noon now. The light of the sun, the salty sea air hit her like a strong gin. The coast road was busy with vehicles, and there were plenty of the uniforms she had got used to in London - Army khaki, the Navy’s deep blue, the lighter slate blue of the RAF, and women in the uniforms of the ATS, the Auxiliary Territorial Service, or the Navy Wrens.

  She walked a little way along the beach. Signs ordered civilians to keep off, and warned that the shingle was mined. And if she looked out to sea, this brilliant summer day, she could actually see the war in Europe, the glint of aircraft swooping low, and she heard the distant crump of guns. A pall of smoke rose up, towering, remote. She found herself noting her impressions for when she next filed some copy. She had barely ventured out of London since the day war had been declared back in September. She tried to imagine this scene being played out in her own homeland, the Atlantic coast fortified in this way.

  But the evacuation was in progress too. In the deeper water Navy ships glided, blue-grey silhouettes, while smaller ships filed steadily towards France and back again, trawlers, drifters, crabbers, shrimpers, fishing smacks, a few lifeboats, and many yachts and small motorboats. Big barges lumbered, emblazoned with the name ‘Pickfords’, intended to haul cargo around the coast. Some of the beach line had been cleared so the boats could ground, the barbed wire cut and pulled back, the tank traps shoved aside. Waiting on the shingle there were stretcher parties, she saw, and the WVS, the Women’s Voluntary Service, had set out tables done out with little Union flags and signs saying ‘WELCOME HOME OUR BOYS’. Tea boiled in huge urns, and sandwiches piled up on plates. But the tea went undrunk, the sandwiches uneaten.

  This was Operation Dynamo, the evacuation from France. The BBC had been playing this up all night, the little ships of England sailing to France to help the Navy bring home a defeated army. But the little ships were, shockingly, coming back empty.

  ‘You can’t park here, madam.’ She turned to face a man, quite young, in a heavy black jacket and a tin hat that looked like a relic of the Great War. He had a rifle, a canvas gas-mask pouch slung over his shoulder, and an armband with ‘ARP’ stitched into it. Air Raid Precautions, another of Britain’s new volunteer armies. ‘We’re trying to keep the beaches clear, and the run into town.’

  ‘Yes, I can see that. I’m sorry. Look—’

  ‘And you ought to have your gas-mask with you.’

  ‘Well, it’s in the car.’

  ‘The rule is, carry it at all times.’ His accent was what she thought of as neutral English; he sounded quite well educated. He was looking at her more closely now, suspiciously. ‘May I ask what you’re doing here? You seem lost.’

  ‘I’m trying to get to Hastings. My son is coming home with the BEF, or I hope he is.’

  ‘And you don’t know where Hastings is?’

  She tried to keep a lid on her temper. ‘I don’t even know where I am. Look, if you could just point me at Hastings—’

  ‘Where are you fr
om? Canada? I know there are Canadian units in the BEF.’

  ‘No, I’m American. Easy mistake to make.’

  His eyes narrowed and he stepped towards her. He limped slightly; maybe that was what had kept him from the call-up. ‘No need for that tone, madam. You’re in Bexhill.’ He pointed east, along the coast road. ‘Hastings is a few miles thataway. Just keep on through Saint Leonard’s and you can’t miss it.’

  ‘Thanks.’ She hurried back to her car.

  In her rear-view mirror she could see him stand there and watch her pull out. She reminded herself that she was at the besieged coast of a country where there was a strong suspicion that the enemy wasn’t just coming but might already be here, in one disguise or another. He fixed his helmet and continued his patrol along the sea front.

  It was a straightforward drive east, though the coast road was crowded with trucks and buses and other transports, and, ominously, ambulances.

  She came into another town. She saw a pier, with boats clustered around its great feet. The pier had been severed so it couldn’t be used by invading Germans. She kept pushing forward until the road passed the base of a hill, a stratified cliff on which sprawled the ruins of a castle. This was a seaside town, with hotels and a bandstand. She saw no children around on this summer Saturday. All evacuated inland, no doubt, because of the invasion scare. Still, it was eerie. And ahead of her an unlikely sight loomed, a school of tremendous silvery fish straining on tense cables into the air. They were barrage balloons; evidently air attacks were expected.

  Soon she saw a harbour wall jutting out to sea. But she wasn’t able to reach the harbour itself, for the coast road was blocked. Uniforms swarmed everywhere. Once more at a loss she turned inland, scanning for information points and police officers.

  She passed an open space that seemed to have been set up as a medical triage centre for refugees, where bewildered-looking civilians were tended to by kindly nurses and other volunteers. A white-coated doctor sat with one woman, gently trying to prise something from her. As she drove past, Mary saw that it was an arm, the severed arm of a child, blackened and burned. The sight bewildered Mary. She was supposed to be a journalist, at least pro tem. How could she write about this?

  She came to yet another hold-up, ahead of a piece of wasteland. This was the anchor point for one of the barrage balloons. The steel-grey monster, an envelope of hydrogen sixty feet long, loomed quite low over the rooftops, in the middle of being deployed. It was tethered to the ground by thick steel cables, and its crew was struggling to control the cables’ release from massive winches. Most of them were women, straining and sweating, in the colours of the ATS, the Wrens, and a few WAAFs, the Women’s Auxiliary Air Force. An officer, male, stood by, steadily counting to give the crew rhythm as they heaved. Mary stared, amazed at the sight of this miniature zeppelin rising up from the streets of this seaside town.

  One of the WAAFs lost her hat as Mary watched, and bright red hair tumbled loose. Mary thought she knew who she was. She parked hastily, ignoring the shouts of yet another ARP warden, and she got out of the car and ran forward. ‘Hilda! Hilda Tanner!’

  The young WAAF turned. Mary waved, still pushing forward. The WAAF had a word with the officer, and he released her from the crew with a brisk nod. Hilda picked up her cap, crammed her red hair beneath it, and hurried towards Mary.

  Mary felt relief gush. It wasn’t Gary, but it was one step closer. ‘Hilda? Look, you don’t know me. We haven’t met. I only knew you from the photographs—’

  Hearing her accent, Hilda evidently guessed who Mary was. ‘You’re Gary’s mother.’

  ‘He did speak of you, and how he’d met you here - I was stuck in London, you see - and then the embarkation came—’ Unaccountably her vision blurred.

  The girl took her arms. ‘Here, don’t take on so. Come with me. Here, sit down.’ She led Mary to a bench; some of its slats had been removed, maybe for firewood, but it was possible to perch on it. Sitting there, in the sharp sunlight, Mary felt the last of her energy drain out of her.

  Hilda was as pretty as her photographs had suggested, but with a long, rather serious face, a strong nose, and a determined set to her chin. She didn’t seem to be wearing any make-up; that bright red hair, struggling to escape from her cap, was the most colourful thing about her. ‘What are you doing here, Mrs Wooler?’

  ‘Mary. Call me Mary, for God’s sake.’

  ‘It’s Gary, isn’t it?’ Her voice rose. ‘Has something happened to him? I’ve had no news since—’

  ‘There’s nothing bad, that I know of.’ She told her what she had learned from the War Office.

  ‘And so you came.’

  ‘Yeah. The trouble is I don’t know what to do now I’m here.’

  ‘Then it’s lucky you found me,’ Hilda said firmly. ‘We’ll ask my dad.’

  ‘Your dad?’

  ‘You’ll see.’ Hilda took Mary’s hand, stood, and led Mary away from the sea front and into the town. But as they walked she glanced across at the work unit still labouring at the balloon.

  Mary asked, ‘Are you sure you can get away?’

  ‘Oh, they can manage without me. Tricky job, mind. If the wind changes you get a bag of hydrogen coming down in the middle of town, and one fag-end and it’s blammo. Of course we WAAFs could manage it alone, but the men would never admit to that.’ She turned her palm to show what looked like rope bums. ‘They call us “amazons, you know. In the papers.’ She laughed, quite gaily.

  ‘I’m partly responsible for that, I suppose. I’m a journalist of sorts, a stringer for the Boston Traveller.’

  Her eyes widened. ‘You are? Gary says you’re a historian.’

  ‘A historian by profession. I, we, happened to be here when the war broke out. I looked for something more useful to do.’

  ‘Just as Gary did.’

  ‘To tell you the truth, I tried to stop him joining up. I mean, America isn’t in this war.’

  ‘Do you wish you’d tried harder now?’

  ‘No,’ Mary said, thinking that over. ‘No, I’m proud of him. He did what he thought was right.’

  Hilda nodded. ‘Look, here’s my dad.’

  Her father turned out to be a policeman, a constable in uniform. Today, complete with his gas-mask slung over his shoulder, he was on duty outside the town hall. With various uniforms hurrying to and fro, the building was evidently serving as some kind of information station for the evacuation operation.

  ‘Dad!’ Hilda broke into a run for the last couple of steps, and, suddenly girlish, let him give her a quick uniformed hug.

  ‘Hello, love.’ The father took off his heavy bobby’s helmet, to reveal a square, deeply lined face, greying hair cut short and smoothed flat with pomade. He must have been in his late forties. Mary thought she could see something of his daughter in him; he must have been a looker once. ‘What’s up? Lost your toy balloon?’

  ‘It’s Gary. Dad, he’s back—’

  ‘He might be,’ Mary put in.

  The father eyed her, surprised by her accent. ‘And you are?’

  Hilda introduced her quickly.

  The father shook her hand; his grip was warm, firm and sure. ‘Call me George.’

  ‘Mary.’

  ‘I saw little enough of your son before he was shipped away. But he went off to fight for a good cause. And now you say he’s back?’

  ‘It’s possible. All I really know is that elements of his division should have been brought back here. What I don’t know is where I might find him.’

  George Tanner rubbed his chin. ‘The evacuation’s being going on for about six days already. There are shot-up soldiers all over town - I don’t mean to alarm you, Mary - not enough of them by half, things have gone badly over there. Look, I have contacts of my own. Wait while I nip inside.’ He tucked his helmet under his arm and went into the town hall.

  With her father gone Hilda asked solicitously, ‘How are you bearing up? Would you like a cup of tea?’

&nbs
p; ‘Maybe later,’ Mary said. ‘I’m glad I found you, Hilda. Without you I don’t know what I would have done.’

  ‘Somebody would have helped you. People are like that. Besides, we haven’t done anything yet.’ She was staring at the town hall door. ‘Come on, Dad.’

  George came hurrying out of the hall, fixing his helmet hastily on his head. He carried a slip of paper in his hand. ‘Look, we need to go to the hospital. It’s that way.’ He pointed. ‘It’s only half a mile. I could get a car but it’s going to be quicker to walk it.’ He eyed Mary, uncertain. ‘Are you up to that?’

  ‘I’m tougher than I look.’

  Hilda led the way, hurrying.

  Mary said carefully, ‘So you found him.’

  ‘There’s a record in the log, yes,’ George said, with what sounded like a policeman’s caution. ‘They’ve got everything buttoned down in there, those ATS ladies, it’s quite remarkable. Every last soldier logged in, cross-checked, filed and indexed. If only the generals had done as well in France.’

  Her relief that Gary was here, that he had come through the funnel of the evacuation, was tinged with fear. ‘But he’s in the hospital, you say.’

  ‘When the evacuation started, they cleared out all the hospitals ready to receive the wounded. They set up a few field stations in the schools too. As it turned out there were far fewer coming back than had been planned for.’ He said carefully, ‘You mustn’t read anything into the fact that he’s in hospital. It’s a case of first come first served, not medical need.’

  ‘We’ll know soon enough,’ Hilda said, hurrying forward.

  ‘Afterwards we’ll sort you out,’ George said. ‘Find you somewhere to stay. You can be with us if you like. There’s just the two of us, Hilda and me. My wife passed away a dozen years ago.’

  ‘I’m sorry.’

  ‘Long time ago. Look, is there anybody you’ll need to call? We don’t have a private phone, and the public lines are blocked - well, you know that - but if you want to make a call I’ll take you to the police station. You have a husband - Gary’s father?’