by Lizzie Lane
Days later he was staring across a field of straw stubble. Smoke rose in a feathery plume from the tall brick chimney of his childhood home. He’d never regarded the house so warmly as he did now. The child he had been was like a stranger to him, and the stepfather who had sought to control his love of all things military was no longer despised.
The smell of baking bread greeted him as he pushed open the kitchen door.
His mother was kneading dough, pushing and pulling it in all directions. She looked up, stared then smiled.
‘I wasn’t expecting you to be on leave just yet. Is it a special occasion?’
He nodded. ‘Yes. I have left the army and I am not going back.’
She looked him up and down, frowning at the state of his clothes but not commenting.
After they’d talked more that evening, discussing what he should do with far more understanding and kindness than he deserved, his mother brought a letter out from the pewter box she kept for household letters as opposed to those received with regard to the church.
‘It’s from your Uncle Joseph’s solicitors in England. It seems he has died and left his shop and some money to you.’
Michael had been staggered. ‘But I hardly knew him.’
His mother shrugged. ‘He and my sister Rosa had no children. He took to you when he visited. I expect you remember him visiting.’
Michael suppressed a shudder at the painful reminder, the vindictiveness of the Jungsturm Lieutenant, the taunts of the other boys, his creeping down to the cellar and passing out in pain.
Uncle Joseph had come to his bedroom once the doctor had been and he’d regained consciousness.
His dark eyes had crinkled up quizzically as though he were counting all the hairs on Michael’s head. At last he asked, ‘Why did you do this?’
Michael had stared at him, feeling funny because his penis was wrapped in a great wad of cotton wool and bandages and it throbbed like a stick beating on a drum.
Uncle Joseph had jerked his chin. ‘I see. Or at least I think I see. You do not want to be me. You aren’t me. You never can be me. You are yourself. No matter your roots, your politics or your religion, always be yourself.’ He’d held up one finger as a schoolteacher stressing an important point. ‘Better still … Unto yourself be true.’
Michael remembered the two men who’d been forced to whip each other until one of them fell dead. They might have been Jewish, they might have been communists, but it didn’t matter. Being different should not be a crime. Their sheer helplessness had touched his conscience.
‘He was Jewish,’ he said suddenly.
His mother poured tea, her deep brown eyes glancing up at him and smiling as she answered. ‘Yes. Your Auntie Rosa married him in a civil ceremony. Although she’d been willing to convert, Joseph would have none of it. He didn’t think you could change what was in a person’s heart just by going through a ceremony. He firmly believed that everyone should follow their own conscience – which I think is what you have done,’ she said, finally placing the pot down on the table, her gaze steady and that same smile on her face.
On thinking back to his childhood, he realised that warm smile had always been there, it was just that he hadn’t noticed. And he understood what she meant. Regardless of uniform, the thumping of drums and the blowing of bugles, it could not change the man underneath who would always be guided by his conscience.
‘It will take time, but we must make plans for you to leave,’ said his stepfather.
Michael had never considered him a brave man, but he did now. ‘You could get into serious trouble just for harbouring a deserter.’
‘I will assist any man who stands up for the rights of humanity!’
The table shook and both Michael and his mother jumped as his stepfather’s fist hit the table, just as it sometimes hit the pulpit during a particularly passionate sermon.
‘You have a British passport, it’s just a case of getting you out of the country.’
Just?
It seemed an immense task, but the Lutheran minister knew more dissidents than Michael had ever thought possible, including a banker who had transferred to a Swiss bank once he’d realised that as a Jew he would be dismissed from his present job.
‘Just a few days and you will be leaving us. Is there anything else needing clarification before you go?’
There was one other question that he would have liked to ask, but old habits and the respect of a boy for his elders is never quite overcome. It was respect for his mother’s sensibilities that made him refrain from asking why he’d been circumcised. Somehow it no longer mattered.
‘No,’ he’d said. ‘I think everything is clear.’
Chapter Thirty-Two
In the opinion of Thomas Routledge, Harry Randall was a good-looking gent, smartly dressed, and not at all the sort of bloke likely to punch your teeth down your throat. But Thomas Routledge was not a very good judge of character.
‘’Course I did think of telling yer father I’d seen ’er, cos as you might know, we did do service together in the war, but then Bonehead, who I sees on account of ’im taking me bets in the Red Cow, said that you was paying for information. Well, that was it. I stepped forward, didn’t I. Never was afraid to volunteer information …’
Thomas Routledge made a choking sound as Harry’s hands grabbed his collar, jerking him off his feet.
Harry glared into his face. ‘Say anything to my old man and you’re at the bottom of the river. Savvy?’
Eyes almost popping out of his head, Routledge nodded his agreement.
After letting him go, Harry brushed his hands together, a sign that the matter was finalised and also that he considered Routledge slightly unclean.
Routledge lingered, nervously shuffling his feet and coughing behind his hand.
Harry glared. ‘Well? What the bloody hell are you waiting for? Fuck off!’
Surprised at the outcome of this meeting, Routledge took a step back.
‘My money,’ he said nervously. ‘Twenty quid for information. That’s what I heard.’
Harry narrowed his eyes. He didn’t like Routledge’s sort. It was hard to believe he’d served beside his father, though in one respect they were very alike. They both drank to excess, and both had a violent streak, though, judging by rumour, Thomas Routledge abused his children whereas Henry Randall abused his wife.
Harry peeled four crisp, white fivers from the wedge he kept in his inside pocket.
‘There you are. Might give some of it to that missus of yours so the poor cow can put some food on the table for them kids.’
Routledge smirked. ‘Come off it, ’Arry. You know how it is. A man’s got to live.’
Harry clenched his jaw. ‘Wife and kids come first, or at least they do in my book.’
Routledge hesitated, not sure whether to take his comment seriously. ‘Aw come on …’
Harry’s fierce look sorted things. Routledge was gone, scurrying out of the door of the Catnip Club as though his ass was on fire.
Mark came out from behind the bar and stood beside him, casually wiping the inside of a beer glass.
‘You sleeping over tonight?’
Harry shook his head. ‘Much as I’d like to, there’s something I’ve got to do.’
Mark sighed. ‘So when are we going to be living in this flat – I mean together.’
Harry leaned towards him and waved a finger in front of his face. ‘When I’m good and ready, but first I’ve got to see what the score is with my mum. You can understand that, can’t you?’
Mark smiled and nodded. ‘Of course I can. We all love our mums.’
Harry nodded, relieved that Mark had so willingly accepted his excuse. Mark was besotted with the flat; he hadn’t stopped painting the walls and hanging curtains since Harry had signed the lease. Luckily, he’d been there the night before when the geezer with the pink gin had sidled up to him, seemingly interested in the crossword he’d just completed, and even more intrigued at one
of his word and number grids.
‘How very interesting,’ he’d said, languidly shifting his gaze between the crossword and the grid. ‘What exactly is that?’ he’d asked, a well-manicured finger jabbing at the word grid.
Harry had looked the bloke up and down, immediately recognising a left-footer when he saw one, and a well heeled one at that. The cut of the grey double-breasted jacket was literally more than a few cuts above the one he was wearing, and that hadn’t been cheap. Was bringing up the crossword merely a smokescreen for a chat-up line?
‘It’s a secret code.’
‘Ah. I see. A cipher.’
The way his jaw worked, and the way he said cipher, made Harry wish he’d called it that too. Secret code suddenly seemed so inane, so working class.
‘Yeah. A cipher.’
The man’s voice was as languid as his looks, the hooded eyes seeming to swim over the page like liquid lead.
‘To what purpose?’
The question had taken him by surprise. There was no purpose, but it seemed a betrayal of his own integrity, his own class to say so.
‘I do it for fun. Always have done. I change letters for figures and try to make the grids as difficult as possible, try to forget what the words were in the first place, then go back to them a few months later and try to interpret what I’ve created.’
‘And are you always successful?’
The stranger’s glib tone and fleshy face had seemed to harden up. It made him feel uncomfortable. Normally, he would have told him to sod off, but there was something about the bloke that made him think he wasn’t as soft as he looked.
Harry had thought about it. Finally, he nodded. ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘Yes. I always do.’
He left the club he ran for Charlie Knowles and got into his car. It never failed to make him smile when he got behind the wheel, mostly because he thought about his father’s face when he’d first pulled up in it. Outright shock, and perhaps a bit of envy; after all, the cab Henry Randall drove did not belong to him, it was only his courtesy of the Blue Cab Company.
He hadn’t asked where it came from and what kind of job he was doing where he could afford a car like that. He hadn’t questioned what anyone did since Mary Anne had left. Because he no longer cares, thought Harry, and the thought had surprised him. Other sons might have given their father a more thorough pasting for abusing their mother, but Harry had restrained himself. That one time, he decided, was enough – for now. It was more satisfying to see a very subdued Henry Randall, a man who seemed a shadow of his former self. And now he knew where his mother was. He smiled to himself. He couldn’t wait to see his father’s face when he told him she was living with a foreigner, a man not much older than him, if what he’d heard was right. Well, he hoped the bloke was treating her right; if not he would answer to him.
He looked out at the roads. The main ones were fairly clear now, the snow mostly melted away.
Let the hound see the hare before we do anything else, he decided. He turned the wheel and swung the car into East Street.
Michael was surrounded by the contents of the last remaining cupboard. Mary Anne was sifting through yet another box of gramophone records.
‘Why don’t you sell some of these? There’s far too many.’
At first she presumed his silence was because he didn’t want to make a decision, but when she looked at him she could see that was not the case. He was holding a sheaf of dusty envelopes, and reading a letter he’d taken out from one of them.
‘It is from my mother to my aunt,’ he said quietly.
‘Is it important?’
‘To me it is.’
He looked up at her thoughtfully; she’d noticed he chewed at one corner of his mouth when he was making a decision. Having made it, he passed her the letter.
She read it quickly; there was nothing special about it from what she could see, but something here had affected him. What was it?
She looked up at him. ‘I don’t understand. Your mother is writing about a small operation you had when you were a few months old.’
‘That is it.’
Mary Anne frowned. ‘According to this there was a constriction in your waterworks and the doctor made an incision …’
Anger flashed in his eyes. ‘Circumcision. He carried out a circumcision and all these years I thought I had been born a Jew.’
She remembered the incident he’d told her of. ‘Children can be cruel.’
‘They were encouraged by adults; that is what makes it so bad.’
Settling herself on the chair arm, she stroked the back of his neck where the dark blond curled into his collar.
‘Try not to be bitter. You have the rest of your life ahead of you.’
To her surprise there was no trace of bitterness on his face, only a look of peace in his eyes, as though he had come to a conclusion.
‘With all that is happening in Germany, I now feel privileged to have undergone such a baptism of fire. I thought I was one of the despised and sought to hide my shame in order that I could be as everyone else and accepted by my friends – those I thought were friends.’
Mary Anne hugged his head, hesitating before kissing his crown; the action of a mother rather than a lover. She pushed the thought to the back of her mind.
‘It’s all in the past now.’
‘It was. But now it is here.’
Mary Anne sighed. The war. Everything was changing because of the war; some things for better, and some for the worse; and even worse, she suspected, was yet to come.
Michael pushed the paperwork aside. ‘I will open the shop now.’
Mary Anne bent and picked up the lunchtime crockery. They closed from one until two every day, except Wednesday, of course, when they shut at one for the afternoon.
So far Mary Anne hadn’t chanced serving in the shop, in case she was recognised. She wasn’t quite ready for facing the world just yet. In fact, she was still in the process of coming to terms with the arrangement herself, but was in no doubt that she would be condemned by her peers.
The bedroom wall was no longer between them. They’d shared the same bed for a while. Sometimes she lay awake at night listening to Michael talking in his sleep. Although she didn’t understand German, she understood the emotions behind the words, the shame, the despair and the horror of scenes that would haunt him for the rest of his life.
There were times when she shed her own tears, her concern for her family, especially Stanley, making her think of running back home. Fear of what Henry might do when she got there, especially if he found out that she’d been living with another man, stopped her.
‘Marianna! Marianna! Come out here.’
She loved Michael calling her Marianna. She’d tried correcting him, but he’d told her he preferred that name.
‘It is my name for you. Only I will call you that.’
He was calling her from the shop, and yet surely the door must be open by now? Someone she knew might see her, but he sounded so urgent. She had to go.
Leaving the dishes in the sink, the tap running, she went through to the shop, the old rugs, soft with age slewing sideways beneath her feet.
Michael was standing with his back to her, silently facing another man, initially hiding his identity from her: until she stood beside him.
‘Mum.’
It was easy to fall into his arms, to hug him in much the same way as she had Michael just a few moments earlier.
‘I’ve missed you. We’ve all missed you.’
She couldn’t believe the joy she felt looking up into her son’s face. At first she was lost for words, and then she remembered Michael.
She turned to face him. ‘My son,’ she said.
It was difficult to read the look on Michael’s face, but she guessed he was worried that Harry might cause trouble. She knew he wouldn’t. Harry made up his own mind about everything. He would do whatever he wanted, or whatever she wanted. She knew in her heart that she was the only woman, perhaps the onl
y person, he cared about.
She asked the most important question, the one that would settle all their minds. ‘Have you come here to take me home?’
His brown eyes came to rest on her, totally bereft of judgement. ‘Do you want to come home?’
Not willing to meet Michael’s gaze, she dropped her own to the floor. ‘No. This is where I belong.’ She looked up suddenly. ‘How’s Stanley’s chest? Is he taking his medicine and resting properly? You mustn’t let him run about too much with those rough boys from Sydenham Street, especially when it’s cold, and if he does, he has to rest after to catch his breath and—’
‘Ma, Ma, Ma!’
Laughingly, Harry held her shoulders.
‘Stanley is stronger than you think. He’s getting to be a bit more streetwise than he was, and the boys he’s with look after him fine, and at home our Lizzie makes sure he does all them things you want him to, not that he needs them half the time. Let him grow up, Mum. We all have to sometime, though we might not all end up exactly as you want us to be.’
He raised his eyes from her face, a harder expression entering them when he looked at Michael. ‘I wouldn’t mind knowing exactly how she came here.’
Michael did not flinch but met Harry’s gaze headlong. ‘She was bleeding, bruised and collapsed in my doorway. I tended her and called the doctor.’
Harry gave a slight jerk of his chin indicating that he was satisfied with the explanation. At the same time, his eyes swept over this man his mother appeared to be living with, might even be fond of. He was good at analysing a man’s worthiness. Michael struck him as having integrity. There were few enough of them nowadays.
‘I appreciate what you did, chum.’
His eyes swept between them.
Mary Anne felt a flush of embarrassment plus a need to explain. ‘Harry, I think I should say—’
‘No. You don’t need to explain anything, Ma, and you don’t have to feel guilty about anything. I’m glad you’re being looked after, and if you don’t want to come home at all, then that’s all right by me.’