by John Boyne
“Ten cigarettes,” said the tobacconist. “Thru’pence please.”
Bang!
The first of the doors on the Liverpool train being slammed.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
“You’re a farthing short,” said the man, and Alfie let out a cry of despair as he reached into his pocket and found a single farthing at the bottom of it. “Here,” he said, grabbing the packet and throwing the coin across the counter.
Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!
He ran through the crowd, almost tumbling over as he tried to force his way between them to return to his father.
“All aboard!”
Bang! Bang! Bang!
“Watch where you’re going, boy!”
“Sorry.”
Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!
Finally he broke through. He was back in his usual spot and breathed a sigh of relief. He bent over, a stitch in his side, relieved to see that the chair in front of the shoeshine box was still occupied. When he stood up straight again, he reached out and handed the packet across.
“Cigarettes?” asked Mr. Podgett, the man from the bank. “Thank you, but I’m a pipe man. Is this a new service, then? A shoeshine and a free cigarette? Very enterprising of you, young man, but I’m not sure it’s a very good idea. It’ll eat into your profits.”
Alfie stared at him, his eyes opening wide as he turned, staring around the station. He couldn’t see his father anywhere. He was gone.
He’d stayed where he was.
And then left.
CHAPTER 13
THERE’S A LONG, LONG TRAIL A-WINDING
Alfie ran through the front door of number twelve and collapsed on the bottom stair with his head in his hands. He thought about everything that had happened that day and couldn’t believe how stupid he’d been. He should never have taken Georgie out of the hospital—of course he shouldn’t! How could he have been so stupid? But he had only ever wanted to help his dad, to bring him home to his family. And now he had lost him. What would he do if he was never found again?
He heard voices in the parlor and looked up in hope. Perhaps Georgie had found his way back again? He jumped up and ran inside to find Margie sitting on the broken armchair in front of the fireplace talking to someone on the sofa. He spun around, hoping that he would see his father sitting there—but no, it was Granny Summerfield.
“Alfie,” she said. “What’s the matter with you? You have a guilty expression, and I can’t bear a boy with a guilty expression.”
He looked at his mother, who narrowed her eyes at him suspiciously. “You do look pale,” said Margie. “And your eyes are red. Have you been crying?”
Alfie shook his head. As it happened, he hadn’t been crying, but he had been sitting with his head in his hands, so that might have accounted for the redness.
“No,” he said.
“Where have you been?” asked Granny Summerfield, leaning forward and taking off her spectacles. “You have the look of a boy who’s been up to no good.”
“I haven’t done anything!” he shouted, raising his voice in a way that he had never done in front of his grandmother before.
“Alfie!” said Margie.
“What?” he asked, staring at her before throwing his arms up in the air. “I’m going to my room,” he added, running into the hallway, charging upstairs and into his bedroom, where he slammed the door shut behind him and flung himself on the bed as he thought through the events of the last couple of hours.
Georgie had gone missing when he’d been at the tobacconist’s stall, and Alfie guessed that it was the sound of all the train doors slamming that had disturbed him. He had already reacted badly to them. And then there had been the way he talked—so strangely, and with sentences that didn’t fit together correctly. He remembered what Dr. Ridgewell had said to him about shell shock: how some of the soldiers who came back from the front looked as if there was nothing wrong with them physically, but inside, in their heads, they were very ill. That was how so many of the men at the East Suffolk had seemed to him. Even the amputees and the burn victims and the men with their arms in slings or their legs in harnesses had stared into the distance or rocked back and forth or sat crying, apparently hurting more than anyone he had ever seen, even more than he had hurt the day Charlie Slipton from number twenty-one threw a stone at him in the street for no reason whatsoever.
He must have run out of the station, Alfie reasoned, when the train doors were slamming. He must have panicked. But where would he go? He might have boarded a train, gone anywhere, and at some point in the journey the conductor would ask for his ticket, he wouldn’t have one, and he’d be thrown off at the next stop. And what would happen then? A man wearing only pajamas under an old pair of trousers and a jacket. How would he ever find his way home again?
There was a rat-a-tat-tat on the front door, and Alfie jumped up. He heard the parlor door opening and Margie marching out into the hall as voices drifted up the stairs, slipped under the doorway and into his room. He stepped out onto the landing and listened.
“Bill,” said Margie.
“Sorry to disturb you, Margie old girl,” said Old Bill Hemperton. “This is probably something and nothing, but I thought I should come and tell you about it.”
“Come into the parlor,” she said. “Granny Summerfield is here too.”
And with that they disappeared into the front room and closed the door behind them and Alfie couldn’t hear them anymore. He stood there, biting his lip, uncertain whether or not he should go downstairs. There was only one thing that Old Bill could have been calling in to say; the same thing he’d called over for earlier.
For a moment Alfie wondered whether he should pack a bag with some clothes, his shoeshine box, the money he had left in his sock drawer, and his copy of Robinson Crusoe and make a run for it. He could get back to King’s Cross and take a train somewhere, anywhere, start a new life. What did he need apart from his shoeshine box, after all? That’s a good honest way to make a living, as Georgie had said.
“Alfie!”
The door in the parlor opened, and Margie roared up the stairs to him. He stepped quickly back into his bedroom and closed the door.
“Alfie!” she shouted again. “Come down these stairs.”
There was nothing he could do. He opened his door and came down slowly, walking into the parlor where Margie was sitting, looking pale with worry. Old Bill looked remorseful, and Granny Summerfield was crying into her handkerchief and saying, “What’s next? What’s next for us now?”
“Sorry about this, sport,” said Old Bill, shrugging his shoulders. “But a man’s gotta do what a man’s gotta do and all that rot. No hard feelings?”
Alfie said nothing; simply looked at his mother and waited for her to speak.
“Tell me Bill is wrong,” she said finally, her voice shaking a little.
“About what?”
“Alfie, I’m going to ask you this only once. Who did you bring back to this house this afternoon?”
Alfie thought about it and hesitated. “This afternoon?” he asked, as if there were any number of people he brought here generally but he couldn’t be quite certain who had come here today.
“Alfie!”
“No one,” he said quickly. “There wasn’t anyone here. Just me.”
“Bill says different.”
“Bill’s a hundred years old. He’s half mad.”
“Strike me!” said Old Bill, shaking his head and laughing.
“Alfie, has your father been here? Tell me the truth.”
Alfie swallowed hard and felt he was on the verge of tears. He mumbled something under his breath, and Margie stepped forward so quickly that he took a step back in fright.
“What did you say?” she asked, raising her voice.
“You said he was on a secret mission for the government!” roared Alfie. “That’s what you told me. But he wasn’t. He was in hospital. And you didn’t let me go and see him.”
“Oh, Alfie
,” said Margie quietly, sinking into the broken armchair in front of the fireplace. “What have you done?”
“I haven’t done anything,” said Alfie.
“So it was him,” said Old Bill. “I knew it was. I might be old, Alfie Summerfield, but I’ve known your father since he was knee-high to a grasshopper and I could tell that was him walking past my window.”
“How did he seem?” asked Margie.
“Well, I don’t know,” said Bill with a shrug. “I only saw him through the net curtain. I’ve no way of telling, do I?”
“Where is he, Alfie?” asked Margie. “Tell me! Wait, is he upstairs? He is, isn’t he? You have him upstairs in your bedroom! Georgie!” she cried, leaping from her chair and running out into the hallway, taking the stairs two at a time—something Alfie had never seen her do before. “Georgie, are you up here?”
She ran into Alfie’s bedroom, and he heard her opening the wardrobe and falling on the floor to look under the bed, and just at that moment there was another knock on the door and Alfie turned to stare at it for a moment before feeling a sense of relief. It was him—it had to be. He was safe. He’d come home. He reached for the latch and opened it, and for a moment he couldn’t quite believe his eyes.
It wasn’t Georgie Summerfield standing there.
It was Dr. Ridgewell.
“You,” said Alfie in astonishment.
The doctor narrowed his eyes and frowned, as if he vaguely recognized the boy but couldn’t remember where from. “This is number twelve, isn’t it?” he asked. “Summerfield residence?”
“Yes,” said Alfie, the word catching in his throat.
“Is your mother home?”
“Alfie, who’s at the door?”
Margie came back downstairs and opened the door wider, staring in disbelief at who was standing on her doorstep.
“Mrs. Summerfield?” asked Dr. Ridgewell.
“That’s right.”
“May I come in? I’m Max Ridgewell. A doctor at the East Suffolk.”
“We’ve met,” said Margie. “Half a dozen times at least.”
“We have?”
“Yes.”
Dr. Ridgewell shook his head and had the good grace to look embarrassed. “I’m sorry, Mrs. Summerfield. There are so many people, you understand. Wives, mothers. I don’t always remember everyone.”
“Come in,” said Margie, opening the door and ushering him into the parlor. “This is my mother-in-law and my next-door neighbor, Mr. Hemperton.”
“Good afternoon,” said Dr. Ridgewell. “Perhaps we should talk privately, Mrs. Summerfield? There are some things that—”
“Anything you have to say to me you can say in front of these people,” said Margie quickly, waving her hand in the air and both embracing and dismissing them in the same gesture. “Have you found him?”
Dr. Ridgewell hesitated and looked surprised. “You know he’s gone missing, then?”
“I guessed. Bill thought he saw him earlier today. And Alfie here”—she nodded in the direction of her son—“he’s got something to do with it. Only he’s not saying as yet. Are you, Alfie?”
Dr. Ridgewell pointed a long bony finger in the air. “I know you, don’t I?” he said.
“No.”
“Yes I do. How do I know you? Your face is familiar to me.” He shook his head and he thought about it. “Wait a minute,” he said after a moment. “You’re not … you’re the boy with the shoeshine stand.”
“The what?” asked Margie.
“Down at King’s Cross. That’s you, isn’t it?”
“No,” said Alfie, looking away.
“Yes it is!”
“Alfie, what’s he talking about?” asked Margie. “A shoeshine stand? You don’t have a … the smell of polish,” she realized, shaking her head. “In your bedroom. I’m always commenting on it.”
“All right, I shine shoes at the station,” admitted Alfie. “But only to help us out. To help you out. I put the money in your purse. You take in washing! You take in darning! I’m doing my bit, like everyone else.”
“A shoeshine boy,” said Granny Summerfield, putting her hands on her face and looking thoroughly appalled. “Have we sunk that low? What’s become of us?”
“Look, can we leave this for now?” said Dr. Ridgewell. “I’m here about your husband, Mrs. Summerfield. You realize he’s gone missing? He’s not at the hospital anymore. And there are reports of a small boy hanging around the premises.”
“Alfie, where is he?” cried Margie, taking him by the shoulders. “Tell me! He’s not well. Don’t you realize that? Your father’s not well! Where have you—”
“I don’t know!” shouted Alfie, bursting into tears now. “I lost him.”
“You lost him?”
“He was with me at the station. I went over to buy him some cigarettes and then he disappeared. There was all this noise, you see. The slamming of doors. I think he was frightened and—”
“He can’t abide loud noises,” said Dr. Ridgewell. “Most of them can’t. It’s all the shelling they had to put up with. It’s played havoc with their nervous systems. That’s why we try to keep the hospital as a place of peace and serenity. It’s why we don’t let children in to visit.”
“I didn’t know he was going, did I?” snapped Margie. “If I’d known, I never would have allowed it. But we have to look for him. He’s out there somewhere. Who knows what harm he could come to? Bill, how about you and I—”
Just then there was yet another knock on the front door, and everyone turned around.
“I’ll get it,” said Granny Summerfield, standing up and going into the hall. When she opened the front door, she slammed it shut again and marched directly back into the parlor.
“Well, who was it?” asked Margie.
“Nobody,” said Granny Summerfield. “Now, Doctor, you were saying…?”
“It can’t have been nobody!” cried Margie, and before Dr. Ridgewell could speak again, there was another knock on the door.
“Ignore it!” cried Granny Summerfield.
“I will not ignore it!” said Margie, marching out of the room, her face growing red with fury. She opened the door, and there was Joe Patience, the conchie from number sixteen, standing outside.
“Joe,” said Margie with a sigh. “It’s not a good time.”
“He’s sitting in my front room,” said Joe.
“Do not let that man into this house!” cried Granny Summerfield, storming out into the hallway now and staring at Joe Patience as if he were the devil incarnate. “Shut it in his face, Margie!”
“Mrs. Summerfield—” said Joe.
“Don’t Mrs. Summerfield me!” roared Granny Summerfield, rushing forward. “Everything I did for you, Joe Patience! Everything I did! And how did you repay me? My son goes to war and you—”
“I couldn’t!”
“Because you’re a coward!”
“Because I won’t hurt people! Like I was hurt!”
“Coward!”
“Be quiet!” roared Margie, looking at her mother-in-law as if she might tear her limb from limb. “Joe, what did you just say?”
“He’s sitting in my front room,” repeated Joe.
“Who?” asked Granny Summerfield.
“Your son,” said Joe. “Your husband,” he added, looking at Margie. “Your dad,” he said, turning to Alfie, who was standing behind his mother and grandmother now. “He’s sitting in my front room.”
At first no one moved. Then Margie ran. She broke past Joe and charged along to number sixteen, where the door was swinging open, and disappeared inside.
“What have you done?” asked Granny Summerfield, confused now, her voice filled with bewilderment.
“I haven’t done anything,” said Joe. “Alfie brought him home, didn’t you, Alfie?”
Granny Summerfield turned to look at her grandson as Old Bill Hemperton and Dr. Ridgewell stepped out into the hall.
“I wanted to save him,” said Alfie. “T
hat’s all. You don’t know what it was like there.”
“Alfie came to me,” said Joe, looking at Granny Summerfield. “He told me what he was going to do. I suppose I should have told you. Or Margie. But I didn’t think he’d go through with it. But then I saw them. And I wasn’t sure what to do for the best. I couldn’t come over. Georgie didn’t look right—you understand that, don’t you? I thought if I came over that I might cause more harm than good. So I waited. I followed them. Alfie took him to King’s Cross. I watched them. And when he ran, I ran after him. I caught up with him. I took him for a drink. And we had a chat. Just like old times. And then I brought him home.” He sighed. “I think he’s going to be all right, you know. If we all help him.”
There was a long silence, and Granny Summerfield’s face softened. “You ran after him,” she said quietly.
“Of course I did,” said Joe. “After everything you did for me? He’s my oldest friend. Of course I ran after him.”
Granny Summerfield looked away. She hesitated for a few moments, and then she raised her left hand and reached out toward Joe’s face, to the smooth burn marks that separated his hairline from his forehead. “Joe,” she said. Nothing more.
“I’m sorry,” said Dr. Ridgewell, stepping forward now. “But your son … I need to see him.”
“Of course,” said Joe Patience, pulling back now, and as he did so Granny Summerfield stepped forward and linked her arm through his. “He’s over here. Come across, all of you.”
Joe, Dr. Ridgewell, Granny Summerfield, Alfie, and Old Bill Hemperton all made their way quick-smart to number sixteen and hurried inside, where they found Margie and Georgie sitting on the couch together, holding each other, their heads on each other’s shoulders.
“Georgie!” cried Granny Summerfield, running forward and throwing her arms around both of them.
“Help me,” whispered Georgie, looking up at his mum and his wife. “Help me. Please. Someone help me. My head…”
“Are you all right, Georgie lad?” asked Old Bill Hemperton, leaning forward.
“Mr. Summerfield, it’s me, Dr. Ridgewell.”
“Dad!”