by John Boyne
Christmas, thought Alfie, shaking his head and grabbing one of his horsehair brushes off the ground before an overweight man in a black suit could stand on it and crush it. It’s always going to be over by Christmas. But what was it Georgie had said in one of his letters? They just didn’t say which Christmas.
He pulled his copy of Robinson Crusoe out of his pocket and started to read, trying to block out the sounds of the ovations and the jeers that seemed to be coming in equal parts from all around him.
“I tell you now,” roared the man on the tea chest, “that the sacrifice that all of you have made, that your loved ones have made, will be remembered forever!” His voice rose on “forever,” and everyone cheered wildly. “We will win this war with honor and bring our boys home!” Another cheer, more jostling in the crowd, and this time a woman nearly fell on top of him; she had the rudeness to place both her hands on his head to steady herself. Alfie felt outraged, absolutely outraged. “Together we will go forward!” continued the man. “United against tyranny! Firm in our resolve! Victory is within our grasp—the end is nigh—keep steady hearts and minds and we shall bring this conflict to an end without any more loss of blood. Thank you, all!”
Everyone whooped and threw their hats in the air—except for one man standing nearby who was shaking his head. He turned and noticed Alfie watching him and said, “The end is nigh all right.” But Alfie looked away and was pleased to notice that the crowd was finally starting to disperse. He glanced up at the enormous clock over the ticket booth. A quarter past two. There was still time to earn a little money if luck was on his side.
“Shoeshine!” he shouted, trying his best to get as much strength and resolve into his voice as the speaker had so he might be heard over the dispersing crowds. “Get your shoeshine here!”
“I believe I’ll get my shoes shined, young man,” said a voice behind him, and he turned around to see the speech maker himself standing there, looking down at him with a smile on his face. He was a tall, thin man with a heavy mustache and thick dark hair parted at the side. He looked tired, as if he hadn’t had a good night’s sleep in a few years, but there was a steely expression in his eyes. He spoke with a strange accent that Alfie didn’t fully recognize. “I have time, don’t I?” he asked another man with a briefcase standing next to him, who glanced up at the clock for a moment before nodding.
“A little time,” he said. “But we need to be at the palace by three.”
“Plenty of time, then. Plenty of time,” he replied, sitting down opposite Alfie on the customers’ chair. “You go get yourself a cup of tea, Rhodhri, and leave me and the boy to our chat. It’s not often I get to speak to one of the young people. What’s your name, lad?”
“Alfie,” said Alfie.
“That’s a fine name, that is,” said the man, nodding his head wisely. “I had a friend called Alfie when I was a boy. He had six spaniels, and he called them Alfie the First, Alfie the Second, Alfie the Third, and so on, as if they were kings.”
“Hmm,” said Alfie, thinking this was rather ridiculous. There had only been one King Alfred, as far as he knew. Alfred the Great. He liked the sound of that. Alfie the Great!
“Anyway, down to business, lad,” said the man. “A nice shiny tip, if you please, take the dust off the sides, and something to get rid of the scuffs on the heels. Don’t be shy with the polish either.”
Alfie nodded and took out his brushes and jars, settling the man’s left shoe on the footrest.
“Perhaps I shouldn’t ask this,” the man said after a moment, “but shouldn’t you be in school today? Or maybe all the London schools have closed down and no one has had the good grace to tell me!”
“I was sick, sir,” said Alfie.
“Then what are you doing here?”
“I mean, my teacher was sick. So we were given a half-day’s holiday.”
“I don’t believe a word of it. But we won’t fall out over a little white lie. At least you’re here earning a living for your family and not wasting your time on the streets doing nothing. You do give your earnings to your mother, I hope?”
“I do, sir, yes,” replied Alfie, neglecting to mention that he had kept some of it back for his secret mission and was keeping even more back now for secret mission part two, which was going to take even more planning than the first one but was infinitely more important. And considerably more dangerous.
“Good boy. You give a quality shine too, I’ll give you that,” the man added, looking down at the way Alfie’s hands moved quickly over his shoes, adding just the right amount of polish here, clearing a bit of dirt away there, the dusters and brushes moving as if independent of his hands. “You must have been at this awhile. A right little professional, aren’t you?”
“Thank you, sir,” said Alfie, tapping the tip of the left shoe with his fingers to indicate that it was done. The man took his foot down and replaced it with the other one, and Alfie got to work again.
“My cousin Thomas used to shine shoes at the train station in Llanystumdwy,” said the man, taking a pipe from his pocket and lighting it up, waiting a moment to allow the flame from the match to connect with the tobacco in the bowl. “Funny fellow, he was. Wouldn’t get a haircut on account of the fact that he was afraid of the barber’s scissors. Believed he had nerve endings in his hair, see. That was a long time ago now, of course. It’s pleasant just to sit here, though. I don’t get a lot of time to sit around doing nothing.”
“You have a job then, sir?” asked Alfie, who assumed the man was unemployed if he could afford to stand around train stations in the middle of the day, making a show of himself.
“Oh, I do, I do,” said the man.
“Giving speeches?” asked Alfie.
“Amongst other things. Politics should be about doing things, though, not just talking about doing things, don’t you agree? But if you don’t get out among the people, then they start to think that you’ve forgotten them and they look around to see whether someone else might do a better job. Do you know who told me that?”
“No, sir.”
“The king,” he replied with a smile. “He makes the occasional remark that’s worth remembering. There was one last year too. I wrote it down somewhere. He’s due another any day now. We live in hope, anyway.”
Alfie stopped what he was doing and looked up in astonishment. “Have you really met the king?” he asked.
“Of course. Many times. I see him two or three afternoons a week at least. I have a meeting with him in about half an hour, as it happens.”
Alfie smiled and shook his head. He came across all sorts of strange folk in this job, and even though the man seemed respectable enough, he was obviously mad or delusional or both. He glanced over toward the station entrance, where a group of men in suits were all standing, smoking, and chatting, and then, to his horror, he saw a woman stepping through the center of them and looking around the station as if she were lost.
The very last person Alfie expected to see today.
His mum, Margie.
“Work here every day, do you, lad?” asked the man, and Alfie looked back up at him and blinked.
“I beg your pardon, sir?” he asked.
“I wondered whether you work here every day. You can tell me the truth. I won’t be reporting back to the cabinet on it.”
“Four days a week,” said Alfie, who felt somehow that he could trust him not to report him to the headmaster. “Tuesdays, Wednesdays, Fridays, and Saturdays. I go to school on Mondays and Thursdays.”
“And Sundays?”
“I take a rest on Sundays,” said Alfie. He glanced around again and watched as his mother searched in her bag for something; when she looked up, he picked his cap up off the ground, emptied his earnings into the bottom of Mr. Janáček’s shoeshine box, and pulled it low over his head so there was less chance of his being seen.
“You’re not the first to do that,” said the man. “What I wouldn’t give for a rest on a Sunday! I would think all my
Christmases had come together.”
Alfie dared to look around once more; now his mother was standing in the center of the concourse staring up at the information board before turning her head to glance at the clock over the ticket booth. And then, before he could look away, she stared in his direction. He looked down quickly, pulling the cap lower still as he continued with his shining. Peering around only a little, his heart sank when he realized that Margie was walking directly toward him, looking as if she couldn’t quite believe the evidence of her own eyes. Alfie shook his head, devastated, and waited. He’d been caught. Everything would come out now.
He would never get to complete his secret mission part two.
Georgie would be condemned to that horrible place forever.
“I don’t believe it,” said Margie, standing over him now. “I saw you over here and wondered whether my eyes were playing tricks on me.”
Alfie reached up to take his cap off, but before he could do so, the man had spoken.
“If you are wondering whether I am who you think I am,” he said, “then yes, I am.”
“I thought as much,” said Margie. “I recognize you from the newspapers.”
“David Lloyd George,” said the man, extending his hand.
“Margie Summerfield,” said Margie.
“It’s a pleasure, madam.”
Alfie held his breath. Could it be that she had not seen him after all? She was standing right over him, but his cap was pulled well down over his face. She wasn’t even looking at the shoeshine boy.
“I wouldn’t have thought that the prime minister could sit around having his shoes shined in the middle of the afternoon,” said Margie. “You do know there’s a war going on, don’t you?”
“I do, Mrs. Summerfield, yes,” said the man, his voice growing a little deeper now. “But even prime ministers are allowed a few minutes to themselves.”
Alfie could scarcely believe his ears. The prime minister?
“I’m sorry,” said Margie. “That was rude of me.”
“It’s quite all right.”
“I’m just so tired.”
“Please,” he insisted. “I took no offense. We live in stressful times.”
“May I ask you something?”
“You may.”
Margie didn’t hesitate. “When will this blessed war be over? And please don’t say by Christmas. Give me an honest answer. Even if it’s not the one I want to hear.”
There was a long pause, and finally Mr. Lloyd George simply sighed and shrugged his shoulders. “I don’t know,” he said. “Soon, I hope. Very soon. Can I be absolutely honest with you?”
“Yes.”
“It will be over within the week or it will drag on interminably. It depends on various issues which are being resolved at the moment. But I am hopeful, Mrs. Summerfield. I remain hopeful. You have a husband fighting over there?”
Margie shook her head. “Not anymore,” she said.
“I’m very sorry.”
“No, you misunderstand me,” said Margie quickly. “He’s not dead. He’s in hospital.”
“Wounded?”
“Not physically.”
Another pause. “Then in what way?” he asked.
“They’re calling it shell shock, aren’t they?” said Margie, and Alfie’s eyes opened wide now. That was the word that Marian Bancroft had used on the train.
“Ah yes,” said Mr. Lloyd George. “Yes, that is indeed what they’re calling it. Mr. Asquith has spoken to me about this—it’s difficult to know what to make of it.” Alfie couldn’t believe how ridiculous this conversation had become. Mr. Asquith had talked about shell shock? Now he’d heard everything. “When a man has his legs blown off, the evidence is there before one’s eyes. When he says that his mind is destroyed, well…” He trailed off.
“You think these men are lying?” asked Margie, the steel evident in her voice. “You think they’re cowards? That they don’t want to fight?”
“Not at all,” he replied. “I don’t know enough about the condition, that’s the truth of it.”
“Then perhaps you should find out.”
“Yes,” said Mr. Lloyd George. “Yes, perhaps I should.”
Margie glanced at her watch. “I better go,” she said. “I’m visiting my husband in hospital.”
“Which hospital is he in?”
“The East Suffolk and Ipswich.”
“That’s a fine place. I wish him a swift recovery.”
“Do something,” said Margie, leaning forward now, so close that if she had just glanced to her left and a little down, she would have locked eyes with her son. “Do something to end it. Please.”
And with that, she turned away and marched toward the ticket booth, opening her bag as she did so and taking out her purse.
“A distraught woman,” said Mr. Lloyd George, sitting down again with a sigh. “There are so many with loved ones who have been lost or wounded. Tell me about your family, boy. You have brothers? A father?”
“I don’t have any brothers,” said Alfie.
“And you never had any?”
Alfie frowned; this seemed like a strange question to ask. But then he realized what the man meant and shook his head. “No,” he said. “It’s always been just me.”
“And your father?” continued Mr. Lloyd George, a note of apprehension creeping into his voice. “He is keeping well?”
“He’s in France,” said Alfie, lying. “He’s over there doing his bit.” A phrase he had heard Old Bill Hemperton say on a hundred occasions.
“I hope he stays safe,” said the prime minister. “You must be proud of him, yes?”
Alfie said nothing, just nodded his head and continued cleaning the prime minister’s shoes. He looked over toward the ticket booth and twisted a little so he was less visible to his mother if she turned around again.
“Are you really the prime minister?” he asked after a moment.
Mr. Lloyd George nodded. “I am, lad, yes. If you can believe it. Don’t I look like a prime minister, then?”
Alfie considered it. “I don’t know,” he said. “I don’t know what a prime minister is supposed to look like.”
“Picture a man,” said Mr. Lloyd George. “About six feet in height. With a mustache and a pipe. Give him a friendly smile and a Welsh accent. And there you have it. The very model of a perfect British prime minister.”
Alfie smiled. Welsh! Of course, that’s what his accent was.
“I have a friend who wants to be prime minister,” he said after a moment.
“Oh yes? And what’s his name, then?”
“Kalena Janáček. And he’s not a he, he’s a she.”
Mr. Lloyd George burst out laughing and shook his head. “Don’t you mean she’d like to be married to the prime minister?” he said, and Alfie frowned.
“No,” he said. “She wants to be the prime minister. Herself.”
“Well, it’s a radical idea,” Lloyd George replied, thinking about it and puffing on his pipe for a moment. “But we live in an age of radicals, Master Summerfield, so I wouldn’t rule anything out. You may tell her that I said that.”
“I don’t see her anymore,” said Alfie.
“Why not? Did you have a falling-out?”
“You took her away,” said Alfie. “Her and her father. They were sent to the Isle of Man.”
The Prime Minister nodded and considered it. “Janáček—that’s what you said, isn’t it? Austrian, were they? Polish?”
“English. She was born three doors down from me.”
“A curious name for an English girl.”
“Her father came here from Prague.”
“So half Austro-Hungarian, half English, then.”
“She wasn’t a fraction.”
Mr. Lloyd George frowned and looked at the boy with a concerned expression on his face. “You’re a bright one, aren’t you?” he said after a long pause. Alfie glanced toward the ticket booth again; Margie was now first in the queu
e and speaking to the man behind the counter.
“How do they look, sir?” he asked, sitting back and letting the prime minister examine his shoes.
“Excellent job, my boy,” he said. “I’m very grateful. I have an appointment with His Majesty in about twenty minutes, and it’s important to look one’s best when courting royalty. They have the most curious obsessions.” Alfie’s eyes opened wide; he found it hard to believe that he had just shone a pair of shoes that would soon be standing before the king. “Of course, the king’s own shoes are always sparkling,” added Mr. Lloyd George. “I think he has a boy on the staff to do it for him. Or a fleet of them. I think he breeds them in-house. Now wouldn’t that be a fine position for a lad like you?” he added, smiling, and Alfie felt himself beginning to laugh. It was a fantastical idea. “Anyway,” he said after a moment. “How much do I owe you?”
“A penny, sir,” said Alfie, and the prime minister reached into his pocket and threw three pennies into Alfie’s cap. “One for you, one for your mother, and one to keep your father safe from harm,” he said. “Ta-ra now, Alfie. Thanks for the shine.”
As he headed back toward his companion, Margie turned away from the ticket counter and Alfie watched as she stared directly into the prime minister’s face. He was accustomed to being stared at, of course, so he didn’t look away but gave her a polite bow and a tip of his hat as he walked on. Alfie moved behind the pillar and watched her as she stared, before shaking her head and walking over to platform two to board her train. Only when she was safely out of sight did Alfie run around to the information chart to find out where her train was going.
He wasn’t surprised by the destination he read there: Ipswich.
* * *
It was later in the afternoon than Alfie usually stayed by his shoeshine stand, but he was determined to wait, for the man usually showed up on Tuesday afternoons. The time passed slowly, but finally his patience was rewarded when he looked up to see the doctor from the East Suffolk and Ipswich Hospital (the same one whose papers had blown around the concourse a week before) marching toward him. He stared at him and swallowed.