‘And have us live as fugitives?’ His voice held dismay. ‘To be forever on the move?’
‘I don’t know what else to do! I can’t lose you, I can’t!’ Her tears were not of joy but of desperation now.
‘I’m not so keen on dying meself,’ came Marty’s grave response as he rested his chin on her head and gazed into a bleak future. ‘I just keep asking meself if there’s any point in running. Should I be a man, go back and face what’s coming?’
‘No! It’s nothing to do with being a man, it’s just not right that you should die for something you haven’t done! How could they reach such a conclusion?’
Mystified, he shook his head. ‘There’s no rhyme or reason, darlin’. I knew a man who deliberately went AWOL and they only gave him twenty-eight days.’
This only served to increase her anger and desperation. She clung to him. ‘Please, please come with me!’
‘They’ll get me in the end.’ He looked down into her crazed eyes, then administered tender kisses. ‘They always do.’ He had heard of men on the run for a year only to be captured and shot.
‘Is that any reason not to try?’ Etta shook him violently. ‘Don’t leave me, Marty! I won’t let you!’
‘All right.’ He gave a quick decisive nod, dashed a last kiss to her face and began ripping off his army clothes. ‘But, one thing: if we don’t make it, will ye let Ma and Da know I’m not a coward?’
‘Yes! But we will make it!’ Shaking out the civilian jacket she grasped his arm and helped to direct it into a sleeve, urging him to hurry.
The carriage door was suddenly wrenched open, causing both to exclaim and to behold the provost in dismay. For one split second Marty was poised to leap out of the other door and onto the track, but when a revolver was levelled at him his arms immediately shot upwards in surrender. His face robbed of all hope, he turned again to his wife, his dear beloved wife, looked deeply, longingly into her face, then gave in to the inevitable.
But Etta fought on as the redcap and another hauled Marty off the train, yelled her protest and grabbed at the arm of one of them, trying to drag him off. And when this failed she pulled out her pistol and in the moment of uncertainty that followed screamed at him, ‘Run, Marty, run!’
But to her anguish all he did was to stand there in horror. ‘Ett, don’t be – she doesn’t mean it!’ he cried swiftly, urging his captors not to shoot. ‘It’s not loaded!’
At which she was roughly disarmed and placed under arrest too.
Then they were parted, Marty to his prison cell to await certain death; Etta keening her eternal love for him as she was taken from the town under guard to be shipped back to Blighty.
Come finally to accept his fate, Marty knew he should be preparing to face his Creator, should more closely attend the comforting words of the padre who, along with many a slug of rum, would see him through the ordeal; but for now, in these few last rays of sunlight, he could concentrate on naught except Etta and his children. And it was in writing to each of them, and to his mother and father, that he spent his time until darkness reigned.
Trying to think of words to say, he meditated on the path that had led him to this state. Had he been satisfied with his lot, accepted Etta as the brave and warm and wonderful if scatterbrained woman she was, instead of stupidly quibbling over her laziness around the house and trying to mould her into something she was not, then he would never have run away and joined the army. Maybe, yes maybe, he would still be in a similar position – there were plans to conscript those reluctant to fight – but left to chance, as a married man he might just have escaped the net. As it was, by his own vanity and discontent, he was the master of his own fate.
Filling his chest with air, he listened to the crump and rumble of artillery. This town was reasonably safe but, whilst he had been here it had received the occasional shell from long range to much devastation. Regarding it as merely disconcerting before, now he prayed that such a shell might come and flatten him and rescue him from a more ignoble death.
How much more acute his senses now, so acute that at the merest thought of what lay ahead he felt the pencil in his hand start to tremble, the tremors creeping up his arm into every limb and the panic start to prickle his scalp and to rise in a hot tide to engulf his entire being, and though he gripped his fists and raged and swore at himself to prevent it spilling over, it boiled and surged within his skull, making his feet tap uncontrollably, urging him to run…
A jangle of keys, a steadying voice, a cup of rum pressed into quaking hands.
His letter-writing postponed, Marty gulped great mouthfuls, felt the heat invade his gullet then his gut, drained the whole cup and held it out for more, swallowed some of this too, until the panic was eventually tamed. Then, resuming his epistle, he rushed to add a few final words, so that the recipient might be sure they were his and not the befuddled rantings of a drunkard. And after this, the crutch of alcohol forever by, he sat and prayed for God to lend him strength. He was to need every ounce of this when the key turned in his cell door and the guard admitted two staff officers.
Dawn. The mundane sounds of breakfast being prepared, the clank of dixies, the rumble of gunfire, the clip-clop of hoofs, the crunching of gears as a procession of ambulances arrived with more wounded from the battlefield, the shuffle and tramp of thousands of boots…
In the camp on the outskirts of town, the battalion to which Marty had once belonged was assembled to hear his sentence promulgated. Many of them wept, for they held him dear.
Seated on the edge of his bed of planks, waiting for breakfast, Marty heard a cheer go up and wondered if it was for him. Even now, hours after he himself had heard the incredible news, he was still reeling, unable to fathom how it had happened, nor who had gained his reprieve. It might still be only a fleeting reprieve, for instead of killing him today, the Commander in Chief had decreed that Private Lanegan’s sentence be suspended and that he rejoin the lines for the duration of the war. Who knew how long that would be, nor if he might be hit tomorrow by a German bullet. But for today, thank God, he was alive. He was alive.
About the Author
THE KEEPSAKE
Sheelagh Kelly was born in York. She left school at fifteen and went to work as a book-keeper. She has written for pleasure since she was a small child, but not until 1980 were the seeds sown for her first novel, A Long Way from Heaven, when she developed an interest in genealogy and local history and decided to trace her ancestors’ story. She has since completed many bestselling sagas, most of which are set in or around the city of York.
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Also by Sheelagh Kelly
THE FEENEY FAMILY SAGA
A Long Way from Heaven
For My Brother’s Sins
Erin’s Child
Dickie
My Father, My Son
Jorvik
Shoddy Prince
A Complicated Woman
THE KILMASTER SAGA
A Sense of Duty
Family of the Empire
A Different Kind of Love
Copyright
Harper Collins Publishers
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This paperback edition 2006
First published in Great Britain by Harper Collins Publishers 2006
Copyright © Sheelagh Kelly 2006
Sheelagh Kelly asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.
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EPub Edition © JUNE 2010 ISBN: 978-0-007-39167-7
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The Keepsake Page 48