Name Upon Name

by Wilkinson, Sheena;

  ‘Yes,’ Michael said. ‘I’ve had enough of city streets.’

  That was all he said until they were walking by the river. Helen tried various conversation openings – Sandy’s last letter; Mabel’s adventures in Dublin – but Michael just said yes or no. Maybe they weren’t the most tactful of subjects, but it was so wearing. It was, in fact, very like when Sandy had first come home from hospital.

  And then, along the tow path, watching the slow brown river nose past, with the trees on the opposite bank bent down into frondy caves, he suddenly said, ‘I’d never even been to Dublin before.’

  ‘Me neither.’

  ‘I always wanted to see it. Da was there once and he always talked about it being the glorious capital of a free Ireland one day. Christ! It doesn’t look too glorious now.’

  Helen was silent, scared to say the wrong thing.

  ‘We spent weeks digging trenches and practising with bayonets and – it was all useless. All that teaching us to hate the Hun.’ He pulled at a frond of bracken. ‘I’d rather have been in the muckiest shell-hole on the Western Front than fighting in the streets of my own homeland,’ he said quietly.

  Easy to say, thought Helen, when you’ve never been hear a mucky shell-hole. And then she remembered Sandy’s last letter: ‘I never thought I’d be glad to be over here in a trench but at least we know what we’re up against.’

  ‘It was hell,’ he said.

  His voice shivered and when Helen looked at him she thought there were tears in his eyes. It reminded her of the night he had run away to join up. But he had been drunk then; he was definitely sober now.

  ‘Tell me,’ she said.

  He shook his head and bit down hard on his bottom lip. ‘It’s too terrible. You’ll hate me. I hate myself.’

  She drew herself up to her full height. ‘I’m not a child, you know. Sandy tells me things. Things he wouldn’t tell Aunt Violet. I asked him to. I want to help.’

  Michael sighed. ‘You won’t want to hear what I’ve done.’

  She put her hand on his arm, feeling the rough wool of his uniform. ‘You did what you had to do.’ She thought of Sandy, giving the evidence which led to C’s death. ‘That’s what people have to do in wars.’

  Why had she not been able to think of those words back when Sandy might have needed to hear them?

  ‘But that wasn’t the war I signed up for!’ he cried. ‘I signed up to help fight Germany! To make the war end faster so that Ireland could claim her birthright – to help hold the line –’

  ‘“Wherever it extends”,’ Helen finished for him. Even she knew that speech of Redmond’s, the Nationalist leader. ‘Well, last week the line extended to Dublin,’ she went on. ‘After all, you couldn’t just sit back and let the rebels attack you.’ Remembering something she had heard Aunt Violet say, she added, ‘With their Hun guns!’

  Michael gave a hoarse laugh. ‘There’s plenty of Hun guns up here in loyal Ulster,’ he said. ‘And yes – they were attacking us, Helen, because we were the enemy. I was suddenly the enemy of men I was brought up to revere! My family’s heroes.’ He groaned. ‘It was chaos. Lewis – our officer – he hadn’t a clue. This wasn’t what he’d been trained for either. You didn’t know where they were going to be shooting from – from roofs, out of windows, behind you, in front of you. Sometimes we were shooting blind, just vaguely in the right direction. We weren’t in control. Not the way we’d been trained.’ He rubbed his hand over his mouth. ‘And you didn’t know who was a rebel and who was just – just a person out on the streets.’

  Helen remained quiet, her hand still on his arm.

  ‘We were on this street,’ he said. ‘It was barricaded with all sorts of rubbish – bicycles – there was one the same as Da’s; I kept thinking, what’s my da’s bicycle doing here? – and bedsteads, old fireplaces – I don’t know how they got fireplaces into the streets, maybe I dreamt that? – and this kid started running at us. He was carrying something. Lewis said, “Get him; he’s armed.” And I yelled back, “He’s only a kid, sir.” And Lewis said, “Shoot him, damn you, or I’ll shoot you.”’ He broke off, swallowed.

  ‘So I shot him,’ he said. His hand shook.

  ‘You had to,’ Helen reassured him. Her voice was strong but her heart hammered and she remembered Michael’s hands gentling the injured calf at new year, settling it so carefully on its straw bed. They hadn’t shaken then. ‘You were obeying orders. He’d have shot you quick enough.’

  ‘No. He wouldn’t. He couldn’t.’ Michael’s voice was so thick that Helen had to strain to hear him. ‘When we got to him and rolled him over, it wasn’t a gun he had at all. It was a bottle of ginger-beer. That’s what he was “armed” with, Helen. And I killed him. He was lying in a pool of blood and ginger-beer and broken glass. He was only about ten.’

  Helen thought of the mutilated lamb.

  Michael looked into the river for a long time. ‘I didn’t sign up to kill Irishmen,’ he said, ‘and I certainly didn’t sign up to kill children.’

  His eyes were screwed shut. ‘Every time I close my eyes I see his face.’ He shuddered. ‘I can’t sleep for seeing him. I can’t eat. I feel sick all the time.’ He opened his eyes and looked straight ahead of him at the slow brown river. ‘What am I going to do?’ he asked. ‘I wish – oh God, I wish I could go home.’

  And to Helen’s horror, he started to cry, proper tearing sobs, like a girl. Not like a soldier at all. She wanted to run from his pain as she had run from the lamb – it was too raw, and too frightening. But she didn’t.

  She tightened her hand on his arm and said, ‘Michael – you should go home. You need to be with your family.’

  And this is too big for me.

  He turned to look at her, his face marbled with tears. ‘I can’t,’ he choked out. ‘Remember the letter? – well, of course you do; you delivered it.’ He snapped a twig between his fingers, and when he spoke again his voice was calmer. ‘I asked them, if they forgave me, if I was still their son, to write to me at the camp. But’ – his mouth twisted – ‘not a word. So I know, don’t I? They don’t forgive me and I can’t go home. Ever.’

  His voice cracked, and he put his hand over hers, and she threaded her fingers in his, but could think of nothing to say.

  ‘The morning we were deployed,’ he said, ‘that was the day I gave up hope. I’d lost my family to join the army, and then, when they sent us out to kill Irishmen in our own country – well, it was like I’d lost the army too. Like there was nothing left.’ Before she could say anything, he went on, ‘So you see why I have to desert?’

  ‘But you’ll get yourself killed. Or locked up.’

  ‘Maybe I should be locked up,’ Michael said.

  ‘Don’t be daft. You have your whole life ahead of you.’ Despite the uniform, and being almost five years older than her, Michael seemed suddenly very young. ‘But not if you get arrested for desertion.’

  ‘So I’ll go on the run,’ he said as if this were a sensible solution.

  ‘Don’t be stupid. What kind of life is that?’ Her voice was shrill with worry.

  Michael squeezed her hand and said, ‘Och, Helen, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have worried you with all this. It’s not fair. But you’re the only one I can trust, and –’

  Trust. She looked into the brown Lagan and wondered how it was possible to feel this guilty.

  ‘Michael,’ she said. ‘Maybe you can go home. You see, they haven’t ignored you.’ She swallowed. ‘It was me. I – I didn’t give them the letter.’

  25.

  She cried much more than Michael had, her face a mess of tears and snuffles. Michael was staring at her in disbelief, or disgust, his face a mask she couldn’t read – set and tight, paler than she had ever seen it, his eyes burning black. He no longer seemed very young.

  ‘I trusted you,’ he said. ‘You asked me to trust you. It was all your idea!’

  ‘I – I know,’ she whispered. ‘I’m so sor–’

  ‘
Don’t!’ he shouted.

  He sounded like Uncle Sean, and she stepped back. Spit bloomed in the corners of his lips. She had never been frightened of her cousin before but she was frightened now.

  ‘You’re just a stupid wee girl,’ he said. Then, stumbling against a tree as he did so, he turned and walked away.

  26.

  Michael’s place at the table stayed empty, the white linen napkin rolled into its little silver ring. Mama and Papa quizzed her.

  ‘He can’t just have wandered off and left you on the riverbank? On your own? We only let you go with him because we thought he’d look after you.’

  ‘I don’t need to be looked after,’ she muttered, stabbing her fork into her cutlet.

  She couldn’t eat a thing. There was ginger-beer for a treat. She took one sip, remembered, gagged and set the glass down. She thought of Michael sitting at this table last night, staring at the food. Her eyes filled with tears and she blinked them back.

  ‘You’re fourteen and you’re a girl,’ Mama said. ‘We trusted Michael to take care of you! It’s the least he could do, after we’ve welcomed him into our home!’

  Trust.

  ‘Was he ill, or – or upset?’ Papa asked. ‘He didn’t seem his usual self last night.’

  Helen hesitated. ‘I don’t think he was ill,’ she said honestly. ‘But yes – maybe upset.’

  ‘He’ll need to take himself in hand before he goes to France on Tuesday.’ Mama shook her head.

  ‘Could he have gone home?’ Papa suggested. ‘I know things were difficult – but surely, if he’s going abroad next week, they’d all be prepared to let bygones be bygones? After all he could –’ He left the sentence unfinished but Helen added the words in her head, he could be killed.

  Not if he doesn’t go, she argued to herself. But that wasn’t true, was it? If he didn’t go, he was just as likely to be killed.

  And it was her fault.

  What can I do? she thought. If I tell my parents how mean I’ve been they’ll be shocked. And it won’t do any good. They won’t let me do anything about it. The letter. I have to deliver the letter. Now. And then – well, somehow we have to find him, and make him change his mind.

  She didn’t know how she would do the second of those things. But she could surely get herself to Derryward.

  It was the last place in the world she felt like going. Just remembering the last time she was there made her skin burn.

  But it was the only way she could put things right.

  She couldn’t just say, ‘Oh, by the way, I’m going off on my own to Derryward this afternoon. I’m going to get the train alone and then somehow get from the station to the farm.’

  Maybe it would be enough to tell Papa – not Mama; Mama would be horrified – and he could go with her to Deryward, explain for her. In her imagination she saw her father’s kind, stern face, heard his voice explaining how it wasn’t her fault, how Michael shouldn’t have expected her to do such a thing.

  And then disgust crept down her neck. Michael had only done what she asked him to. ‘You’re just a wee girl,’ he’d said. She squared her shoulders.

  ‘Is it all right if I go round to Mabel’s?’ she asked. ‘She wants us to practise tennis.’

  ‘You were out all morning,’ Mama objected, but Papa said, ‘Och, Eileen, let her. The good weather is to break soon and she’ll be cooped up.’

  Helen dashed up to her room and found the letter. She put it carefully in her school satchel, and added all the money she had; a handkerchief; a book for the train – she didn’t think she could concentrate on reading, but it was a long way, and if someone tried to speak to her, then she could pretend to read and hopefully they would ignore her. She dithered about The Men of ’98 – but it was tough going and besides, was it the sort of book she should be reading in public? It was terribly respectable of course – nothing so dull could be anything else – but someone could see it and get the wrong idea. She thought of the boy Michael had shot in Dublin. She grabbed The Fortunes of Philippa but then set it down again. No. This was a grown-up mission, and she wasn’t going to look like a silly little girl. Instead she looked at the six Jane Austens she had been given for Christmas, fat red editions with the titles in gold, and picked up Emma, which she had started and abandoned because she thought she ought to tackle The Men of ’98.

  She checked her money – it wasn’t enough for a return fare. Where in the house could she find some cash? Mama and Papa weren’t the sort to leave it lying around. And besides, she didn’t think she should add stealing to her crimes.

  Mabel! Mabel still had the birthday money she had saved for Dublin and been unable to spend. And setting off down the street towards Mabel’s house gave verisimilitude to the story that she was going there to play tennis. She added her racquet to the satchel – she could leave it at Mabel’s; she needn’t cart it the whole way to Derryward.

  At the last minute, she scribbled a note.

  Dear Michael, I am so sorry. I know that’s just a word, but I have gone to deliver your letter now. I know I should have done it weeks ago. Please don’t do anything foolish. Helen

  She had been about to write ‘desert’ after ‘Please don’t’, but then she wondered who might read this note if Michael didn’t, so she changed it.

  She put it in one of the envelopes Aunt Violet had given her for Christmas, wrote ‘Michael’ on it, and then added ‘Private’ and left it on her desk. It’s as if I’m running away, she thought. The girls in her school stories were always running away, but usually because they had been Wrongfully Accused.

  She had been Rightfully Accused.

  She just caught Mabel; the whole family was on their way to the Botanic Gardens for an outing. Mabel was horrified at the story Helen told her, and at her plans.

  ‘All the way down there? On the train? On your own? Won’t you be terrified?’

  ‘Yes,’ Helen admitted. ‘But I have to go, Mabs. It’s the only way to put things right.’

  ‘You could post the letter. They’d get it in a day or two.’

  ‘I did think of that. But a day or two could be too late. And what if it got lost? Or ended up in the fire?’

  ‘I think you’re crazy,’ Mabel said, ‘but I’d come with you if I could.’

  ‘I know you would.’ Helen looked down at the ten-shilling note Mabel had given her. ‘I’ll pay you back,’ she said.

  ‘Doesn’t matter.’

  They hugged, and then Helen set off on the longest journey she had ever taken on her own.

  27.

  Helen stood in the middle of the bustling station, jumping at the shrieks of the whistle, and pulled her bag closer to her. She had never been anywhere like this alone before. It was nothing like getting the tram to school every day, or adventuring to Caprini’s with Mabel. It was much scarier than getting the tram home alone from Malone, and that had seemed an adventure at the time. Only a couple of hours ago.

  But it was nothing compared to what Sandy had been doing for over a year. She set her jaw and joined one of the ticket queues.

  The man at the desk looked at her strangely when she asked for a half-fare day return.

  ‘My mother’s just –’ Helen indicated vaguely behind her. ‘She thought the other queue was shorter. We had a sort of argument about it.’ She smiled widely.

  He said nothing, except, ‘Platform 2, ten past. Mind yourself now.’

  She had almost expected the train to look monstrous, like a nightmare train, but of course it looked just as always. She found a corner seat and hoped nobody would sit beside her. She took out Emma and found the place where she had left off, but after a while she set it down and watched the endless red-brick terraces give way to the fields and drumlins of County Down. It was strange not to have Mama or Papa to point out landmarks too – the moment when they crossed the Lagan; the last house in Belfast – they always argued over which actually was the last house – the two chocolate-brown donkeys in the field with the falling-down
barn. She remembered the donkey they had seen that morning.

  She was sure that old couple across the aisle were staring in disapproval – a young girl out on her own! They would know from her clothes she was a schoolgirl. Factory and mill girls her age could go out alone because, of course, they were sort of grown-ups, but even so, you didn’t really see them alone, they were always with their pals. I wish Mabel had come with me, she thought, but then what would she have done when I got there? It was going to be hard enough, explaining, without an audience. Even though Mabel was the nicest girl in the world, she couldn’t be expected to understand this kind of family hoo-ha. George Rae would understand, she thought suddenly. Maybe one day I’ll be able to tell him. Perhaps when I give him back The Men of ’98. Then she thought of how little she would like George to know what a beast she had been, and she sighed and looked back at Emma. Emma could be a bit of a beast too, but at least Jane Austen would make sure it all turned out all right in the end.

  I don’t know how this is going to turn out.

  At Saintfield she looked out to see a soldier get out of the next carriage. He paused on the platform, looked round uncertainly, and then lifted his hand in greeting. A girl in a rust-coloured jacket ran to him, and when he took her in his arms her hat fell half-off. She had hair as red as Sandy’s, all curls. As the train started huffing off again, Helen saw him take her hand.

  By the time the train finally trundled into the little wayside station, Helen was ready to cry with tiredness, and dying to go to the lavatory. The station was too small to have a cloakroom. Never, never had she arrived alone. Never had Uncle Sean or Michael not been there with the mare and the trap. Nobody else got off here and she knew she had a long walk to the farm. At least she needn’t go through the town – you could go that way, past the Gaelic Club and the chapel, and the square of shops and houses; it was a better road, but longer. But there was another way: you crossed the road outside the station, above the mill and the two big houses, and went only a little way up the hill, and then down a tiny road with whin and hawthorn hedges all along one side and the high grey wall of a big estate on the other. The son of the big house in there had been killed at Gallipoli, she remembered being told. The road was very rough: Uncle Sean always said it was hard on the mare’s shoes – if she was going to pick up a stone it was always on that road.