by Sandy Taylor
I felt Olive’s hand slip into mine.
‘Isn’t it lovely?’ I said.
Olive didn’t look too sure. ‘Is it?’ she said, in a quiet little voice.
‘You’ll make new friends, won’t that be nice?’
‘Will it?’
‘Of course it will, and when we write to Mum and Tony, we can tell them all about it.’
Olive’s eyes were filling with tears. ‘I miss Mum,’ she said.
‘I know you do, but you have to be a brave girl and make her proud. She will be here soon and so will Freddie and Tony, and then you can show them around.’
‘Okay, Nell,’ she said.
I looked at the small building and all the children who were strangers to me. Then I closed my hand around the pink shell in my pocket and wished that Angela was here because I was actually feeling just as nervous as Olive.
A lady noticed us and walked across the playground. ‘Hello, Beth,’ she said. ‘I heard that you had taken in two evacuees.’
Auntie smiled at her. ‘This is Nell,’ she said. ‘And this is her little sister, Olive.’
‘Welcome to our school,’ said the lady, smiling at us. ‘I’m sure you will be very happy here.’
‘I dunno about that,’ said Olive, looking anxious.
‘She’s only five,’ I said. ‘And she’s a bit nervous.’
‘There’s nothing to be worried about here, Olive,’ said the lady. Then she called across the playground. ‘Aggie.’
A little girl, who looked the same age as Olive, ran over to us.
‘Aggie, this is Olive. She’s new and I think she would like a friend to show her around. Would you like to do that?’
The girl nodded and smiled at Olive. ‘Wanna play hopscotch?’
Olive looked up at me. ‘Would you like to go with Aggie?’ I said.
‘Okay.’
The two tiny girls held hands and ran across the playground.
‘She’ll be fine,’ said the lady, smiling. ‘My name is Mrs Rogers. Welcome to our school, Nell.’
‘I’ll be here when you come out, Nell,’ said Auntie.
She kissed my cheek and I watched as she walked away. At the gate she turned around and waved. I had a warm feeling inside. Me and Olive couldn’t have come to a better place; we would be loved and cared for. Bermondsey seemed like another life, far away from this little village school and the rolling hills beyond.
I looked across the playground and there was Olive playing hopscotch with Aggie. We were going to be all right.
Chapter Nine
As the weeks turned into months, the little village of Glengaryth became like a second home to us. We both benefited from the good food and fresh air. Olive’s cheeks grew rosy and I wasn’t as skinny as I used to be.
Bermondsey became a distant memory. Of course we missed Mum and Tony and the baby and I missed my good friend, Angela, but without the constant threat of air raids and the fear of a bomb dropping on our heads we were able to relax and run free in the fields and lanes. Sometimes in the evenings we all stood in the garden and watched the red sky over Cardiff, and were reminded that there was still a war on.
Olive and Aggie became great friends and played together every day after school, either at the vicarage or in the sweetshop, where Aggie was billeted.
Olive said that Aggie came from a place called Coventry that seemed to have been bombed almost as much as London.
‘Aggie wants to live here forever,’ announced Olive one day. ‘And I don’t blame her. Imagine livin in a sweetshop.’
‘You’d end up with no teeth, Olive,’ I said.
‘Yeah, but I’d get more, wouldn’t I?’
‘Oh, Olive!’ I said, grinning at her.
‘I would, though.’
‘I suppose you would, but you’d look a bit of a sight while you were waiting for em.’
‘She gets sweets every Friday and she shares them with me. I love Aggie, Nell.’
‘She’s a sweet girl,’ I said.
‘That’s cos she lives in a sweetshop.’
‘Clever dick!’ I said, grinning.
There was no one of my age at the school so I envied Olive her little friend. I had missed having someone to talk to and share things with. That was until the morning I walked into the classroom and saw a tall slim girl standing at the front of the class, grinning like a Cheshire cat. Her hair was dark, almost black, and she wore it in two shiny plaits that hung down either side of her head. She also wore little round glasses that she kept pushing up her nose. I immediately liked the look of her and hoped that we could perhaps be friends.
‘This is Lottie Lovejoy,’ said Mrs Rogers, our teacher. ‘She is an evacuee from Brighton, which is by the seaside.’
I’d heard of Brighton – it wasn’t very far from London. I’d never been there but I knew that posh people went there for their holidays. Our tallyman and his missus went there every year.
‘On our money,’ my mum had said.
It was hard to tell what age Lottie was but she looked about the same age as me. I grinned at her across the classroom.
‘Welcome to our little school, Lottie,’ said Mrs Rogers. ‘Why don’t you sit next to Nell?’ She pointed to the seat beside me. Lottie walked towards me and sat down. She looked at me and grinned. I grinned back at her.
* * *
At playtime we sat on the wall surrounding the playground and got to know each other.
‘What a dump!’ said Lottie, looking around. ‘I can’t understand what half of them are saying.’
‘It’s not a dump,’ I said, smiling at her. ‘You have in fact landed in paradise.’
‘Says you.’
‘Trust me, you’re going to love it here.’
‘Well, at least I can understand what you’re saying and that’s a plus.’
‘That’s cos I’m from London, so I’d be a bit worried if you didn’t.’
‘I’ve been to London – my father was in a play up there and my mother and I went to watch him.’
‘Your dad’s an actor?’ I asked, impressed by this piece of news.
She nodded. ‘That’s why I’m called Lottie, after a music hall star called Lottie Cherry.’
‘Funny sort of name.’
‘It wasn’t her real name, it was her stage name.’
I didn’t know anything about that sort of stuff. I thought that when you were given a name you were stuck with it, even if you didn’t like it. I had no idea that people got to change their names.
‘She also ran the Alhambra theatre in Brighton, so that was the connection,’ continued Lottie.
‘It’s a really pretty name,’ I said.
‘So’s Nell.’
‘Thanks.’
‘You’re welcome.’
‘Who are you staying with?’ I said.
‘Some old biddy called Eliza Strut. She’s a perfectly frightful woman. Spends all day Sunday in church and I’m left to starve. She doesn’t cook on a Sunday, says it’s a sin against God. Personally, I think it’s a sin against me, I’m the one that’s bloody starving!’
‘Sounds rotten. I’ll tell you what, I’ll ask Auntie Beth if you can have your Sunday dinner with us at the vicarage. She’s lovely – I just know she’ll say yes.’
‘Really?’
‘I’ll ask her.’
‘Thanks, Nell, you’re a pal.’
‘You’re lucky this Eliza Strut doesn’t make you go to church with her.’
‘She did try – she said she had a duty to look after my soul as well as my body. I was tempted to tell her that she wasn’t doing much of a job with my body and I wasn’t about to let her get her hands on my soul. Instead, I told her I was an agnostic.’
‘What’s that?’
‘It means I haven’t made my mind up yet.’
‘About what?’
‘About anything really and religion in particular.’
‘And what did she say to that?’
‘If I remember rightl
y, I believe she very nearly choked on a decidedly unappetising excuse for a sausage.’
I’d never met anyone like this girl in my whole life. It was as if she’d landed from another planet. Imagine deciding to be an agnostic. My mum and dad would have thought I was losing my marbles. She talked different to me and Olive and the people we knew back home. I suppose we would have called her posh, but I thought she spoke lovely. I watched her mouth open and close and I was mesmerised by the stuff that came out of it.
‘My father says that I am far too young to decide which faith I want to follow,’ she continued. ‘He said that wisdom and time would decide for me and if I decided that I didn’t believe in any of it, then that was my decision.’
‘Blimey!’
‘I mean, it doesn’t make much sense to me to pour water over a baby’s poor little head and decide for them what they are going to believe. How can a baby know what it’s going to believe in? What faith are you, Nell?’
‘Catholic.’
‘And do you absolutely believe in the teachings of the Catholic Church?’
I stared at her – no one had ever asked me that before.
‘There, you see,’ she said, rather smugly. ‘You don’t know, do you?’
‘I’ve never given it much thought,’ I said.
‘Well, you can now.’
I sat on the wall swinging my legs and thought about our church in Bermondsey before it got bombed: the candles and the smell of incense and the lovely statue of the Virgin Mary and the baby Jesus tucked up in the manger at Christmas. It’s what I knew and it’s what my mum and dad believed, so that made me feel kind of warm and cosy about it.
‘I’ve made up my mind, Lottie.’
‘Crikey, that was quick,’ she said.
‘I like being a Catholic.’
‘Well, at least I made you think about it.’
‘Yes, you did, Lottie Lovejoy, and I shall be eternally grateful to you for that.’
At which point we burst out laughing.
‘Tell me if I go on a bit, Nell. My father says I do – he says that’s why I’ll probably end up on the stage.’
‘Don’t worry, I’ll tell you. I’ve got a tongue in my head too, you know.’
‘That’s why we’re going to be the best of friends, Nell,’ said Lottie, linking her arm through mine.
* * *
I told Auntie Beth about Lottie and how she was an agnostic and lived with Eliza Strut, who was a perfectly frightful woman, and she got no dinner on a Sunday because Eliza Strut was in church all day.
‘So I was wondering if Lottie could come here for her Sunday dinner, Auntie Beth.’
‘Of course she can, Nell, and I’m so pleased you have a friend.’
‘Me too,’ I said. ‘She’s a bit odd though, but, you know, nice odd.’
‘We happen to like odd around here,’ said Auntie Beth, smiling.
‘You’re gonna love Lottie Lovejoy then,’ I said, grinning back.
* * *
We didn’t know the kids from the village very well because we evacuees were in different classes.
‘This is a Welsh-speaking school,’ explained Mrs Rogers. ‘So we decided that it was best to put you in separate classes, otherwise you would find the lessons difficult to understand.’
I thought that made a lot of sense and so did Lottie.
‘School is boring enough,’ she said. ‘Without having to cope with a different language as well.’
‘Don’t you like school then?’
‘Only ever went for one week.’
‘One week!’
‘Yes, and it was a bloody disaster.’
‘Why, what happened?’
‘They called my parents in and complained that they couldn’t teach me because I refused to stay in my seat and wandered round the classroom all day.’
‘What did your mum and dad say?’
‘They told me to collect my coat from the cloakroom and then we left and never went back.’
‘Blimey, didn’t you miss being with kids your own age?’
‘I find that most kids of my age are totally immature.’
‘I’m not.’
‘No, I can see that, and that is why we’ll be friends.’
‘How do you learn things then, if you don’t go to school?’
‘Well, my parents teach me and I read a lot.’
‘So your parents don’t mind you not going to school then?’
‘No, they are all for free expression.’
‘What the hell’s that?’ I said.
‘Well, it means you learn what you are interested in and not what someone decides you’re interested in.’
‘Isn’t it the law though, to go to school?’
‘Some old bloke comes round every now and again to make sure I’m not falling behind other kids of my age. He comes on a bike and he sniffs a lot and smells fishy. My mother opens all the windows once he’s gone.’
‘And are you?’
‘Am I what?’
‘Falling behind?’
‘No, I’m streets ahead of them. I’m probably streets ahead of him as well; he never stays long. He just sort of mumbles and scratches his head and all this white stuff comes out of his hair.’ Lottie shivered. ‘Gross little man! Then he says, “Keep up the good work,” picks up his grubby old briefcase and shuffles off till the next time.’
I’d never met anyone who didn’t go to school and I had a sneaky feeling you had to be rich to get away with it.
‘You don’t have to sit in a stuffy classroom all day to find out what you want to know,’ Lottie went on. ‘There are libraries full of books and they’re free. I choose what I want to learn about, then I go down to the beach and sit on the pebbles and listen to the sea and breathe in good clean air, not farty air from a room full of smelly boys.’
I grinned at this funny, quirky girl. ‘You’re a right card, Lottie Lovejoy.’
‘What’s a card?’
‘It means you’re perfect.’
‘I do my best,’ said Lottie, grinning.
Although I couldn’t understand the Welsh language I loved the way it sounded, like a song or a lovely melody, soft and sort of sing-songy. Is sing-songy a word? Anyway, that’s how it sounded to me.
‘It’s purported to be the oldest language in Britain,’ said Lottie.
‘What does pur… pur…?’
‘Purported?’
‘Yes.’
‘It means they say it is, or they claim it is.’
‘Oh, right.’
‘It’s a Celtic language, like Irish and Scottish.’
‘Blimey, you learned a lot of stuff sittin on them there pebbles!’
‘My point exactly.’
I couldn’t get enough of my new friend; I wanted to know everything about her. ‘Tell me about your home, Lottie,’ I said.
She tossed one of her shiny plaits over her shoulder and said, ‘Well, I think it’s perfect but of course that’s only my opinion. I live in a white house on the seafront in Brighton. It has big bay windows and when you walk into a room you feel as if you are part of the sea, like you’re on a yacht, surrounded by water. And every day it’s different, depending on the weather and the seasons. Sometimes the sea will be a greeny-blue and sometimes grey. Some days it can be angry, splashing over the promenade, and other days it’s as calm as a mill pond with little waves lapping at the shore. My favourite part is in the early evening at low tide when the sand is wet and shiny. I can’t tell you how beautiful that is, Nell. It looks like wet silk, with little rivers of silver water trickling back to the sea.’
I was hanging onto every word that was coming out of Lottie’s mouth – she made me feel as if I was there.
‘I told you to shut me up if I went on too much.’
‘I don’t want you to shut up, because it sounds so lovely. I’ve never seen the sea and you just made it come to life for me.’
‘God, Nell, how bloody awful!’
‘I live
in Bermondsey, we don’t have the seaside, just the river.’
‘Close your eyes, Nell.’
‘Why?’
‘Just close them.’
I closed my eyes and waited for Lottie to speak.
‘When all this is over,’ she said softly, ‘you shall come and stay with me in Brighton and we’ll sit on the pebbles with our backs to the old stone wall and we’ll listen to the sea rolling into the shore. We’ll eat fish and chips out of the paper and then we’ll tuck our knickers in our skirts and paddle into the water up to our knees. I’ll show you the sea, Nell.’
I sighed and opened my eyes. ‘That sounds like heaven,’ I said.
Just then the bell went. ‘Back to farty land,’ said Lottie.
‘Race you,’ I said.
Chapter Ten
I thought that living in the countryside would be boring but it wasn’t, not one bit. Every Saturday night there was a dance in the church hall. Uncle Dylan played all sorts of records and me and Lottie danced away to the music and so did Auntie Beth and Uncle Dylan. The couple from the sweetshop came as well, and Olive and Aggie just ran around the hall with the younger kids from the village.
Once a month we got to see a film on an old projector that kept breaking down, but we didn’t mind. We watched The Thirty-Nine Steps and The Good Companions and we giggled at George Formby and Laurel and Hardy. It was packed the night How Green Was My Valley was on, because it was set in Wales and everyone in the village wanted to see it. There weren’t enough seats, so Uncle Dylan put the film on for two nights, and me and Lottie went twice. We wept both nights when little Hugh’s father died in a disaster down the pit. There was plenty of sniffing going on so I guess it affected a lot of people – even some of the men had glassy eyes. The boys liked the Westerns best and they screamed and booed the baddies as they chased Hopalong Cassidy and his faithful horse Topper across the screen. Afterwards they ran around outside shooting each other and pretending to fall down dead.