The Runaway Children

by Sandy Taylor

  ‘Infantile,’ pronounced Lottie, raising her eyes to the heavens.

  Me and Lottie loved those evenings, sitting in the dark in the little hall, sharing Aggie’s sweets. It was even better on the grey days, when the rain hammered down on the roof and we were all warm and cosy inside.

  Every Sunday morning, we walked down the lane to the chapel. I don’t think God minded much that there were a couple of lapsed Catholics and an agnostic in the congregation. It was a very simple place, unlike the Catholic church in Bermondsey, which was full of ornate statues and gold pillars. The only thing I missed was the statue of the blessed Virgin Mary. Uncle Dylan didn’t wear a fancy costume or preach hell and damnation from the pulpit; he preached love and forgiveness. He not only prayed for our boys who were fighting in the war, he also prayed for the enemy, who he said were just young lads like our own. They were someone’s son, someone’s brother, someone’s beloved grandchild. They were loved and if they lost their lives fighting for their country they would be mourned, in exactly the same way that our lads would be mourned. He said they deserved our prayers.

  Lottie and I joined the church choir and we sang hymns in Welsh. It didn’t bother me that I didn’t have a clue what we were singing about because the Catholic Mass was in Latin and I didn’t have a clue what that was about either.

  Spring gave way to summer and we ran the hills and lanes around Glengaryth. We knew how lucky we were to have found this place in this lovely land. Me and Olive had been taken in by strangers who had opened up their home and their hearts to us. I would never forget this wonderful summer when we were free from harm and we could just be children.

  The only thing that was causing us sadness was that Mum, Tony and Freddie hadn’t yet left Bermondsey. If Mum could only see this place, if she could see how healthy we both were. We had filled out, Olive’s skin glowed from being outside all the time, and we weren’t pasty-faced like everybody at home anymore. If she would just get on the train and come she would see for herself how wonderful it was. But all she ever said in her letters was that Freddie was a sickly baby and they couldn’t travel yet.

  One afternoon me and Lottie wandered down to the pond and sat on the grass.

  ‘It just doesn’t make any sense to me, Lottie,’ I said. ‘I mean, if Freddie is sickly then this is the perfect place for him to be, isn’t it? Away from that damp flat and the smog and the bombs. Why won’t she come?’

  ‘Grown-ups can be tricky creatures, Nell,’ said Lottie, taking off her glasses and polishing them on the hem of her skirt. ‘It’s fear of the unknown, I expect. My dad says the best thing you can do in this life is to embrace new beginnings, take every new opportunity you can. Face your fears and do it anyway.’

  ‘We don’t even think like that where I come from, Lottie. In fact, everyone seems to enjoy being scared of something or other. Our neighbour, Mrs Baxter, is terrified of thunder and lightning, so she leaves her poor one-legged husband on his own and hammers on our door, weeping and wailing. Then she dives under the table and stays there until it’s over. We have to eat our food with her underneath us. I think if we told her to face her fear and do it anyway she’d likely clobber us. I don’t know why she couldn’t dive under her own table.’

  ‘I know I’m lucky to have parents that encourage me to think for myself,’ said Lottie. ‘I’m not saying they love me more than your parents love you, of course I’m not, Nell. But they have taught me not to let fear get in the way of what I want and to stand up for what I believe in.’

  I nodded. ‘We definitely come from different worlds, Lottie, but I think that I am learning things from you that I like and they are things I would never have learned if we hadn’t met.’

  Lottie put her arm around my shoulder. ‘And I am learning things from you, Nell. So aren’t we the lucky ones?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And I’m sure your mum will soon pluck up the courage to get on that train.’

  ‘I hope so, because Olive has stopped mentioning her – she’ll be calling Auntie Beth “Mummy” at this rate.’

  ‘Then you’ll just have to remind her, won’t you? That she has a mummy in Bermondsey who loves her.’

  My fingers closed around the locket.

  ‘That’s lovely,’ said Lottie.

  I opened it and showed her the photographs inside.

  ‘Your parents?’ she asked, smiling.

  I nodded. ‘On their wedding day.’

  ‘A very handsome couple, but they look as if they are about to be executed.’

  ‘My mum said they were terrified.’

  ‘Is your dad away at war?’

  ‘Isn’t everyone’s dad away at war?’

  ‘Sort of.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Well, my father is certainly overseas but not in a fighting capacity.’

  ‘What other capacity is there?’ I asked.

  ‘He’s entertaining the troops.’

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘He’s part of a concert party. My father doesn’t believe in killing another human being, Nell, and I’m pretty sure if he wasn’t in a concert party he would be in prison. But as he said to me and my mother, he would rather be locked up than take the life of another person.’

  ‘Well, I should think the soldiers need a bit of entertainment.’

  Lottie looked out over the pond. ‘He’s not a coward, you know?’

  ‘Of course he’s not, Lottie. I think he sounds like a wonderful dad.’

  Lottie smiled at me. ‘He is.’

  Suddenly we heard a low throbbing sound. We looked up and saw to our horror that there was a plane coming in low over the houses, just skimming the trees.

  Lottie grabbed my hand and we started running but we didn’t know where to run to for safety.

  The noise of the plane was getting louder and it was now making a sort of put-put sound.

  ‘It’s going to crash, Nell!’ screamed Lottie.

  A boy shouted to us from across the street. ‘Over here! Quickly.’

  We ran across to him and he guided us through the bakery and out the back to an Anderson shelter.

  Mr and Mrs Evans, who owned the bakery, were huddled together on a bench and the rest, mostly young boys, were sitting on the floor. We squashed in beside them as best we could, grateful to have got to safety.

  ‘Thanks,’ said Lottie to the boy.

  ‘Didn’t want our little evacuees getting squashed, did we, my lovely?’ he said, grinning.

  Lottie immediately took offence. ‘For a start, I’m not your “lovely” and I think you will find that, on the nationwide percentile scale, we are both, in fact, taller than average for our ages.’

  The boy didn’t get a chance to answer as a tremendous explosion rattled the Anderson shelter and shook the ground beneath us. Mrs Evans made the sign of the cross. ‘Oh, dear God,’ she said. ‘Some poor soul is on his way to heaven, Mr Evans.’

  ‘Well, let’s hope he’s German,’ said one of the boys.

  ‘Daffyd Wynne!’ said Mrs Evans. ‘Did our good vicar not teach you that we are all God’s children, no matter where we come from or what our beliefs are?’

  The boy in question looked suitably shamefaced. ‘Sorry, Mrs Evans,’ he said.

  ‘I should think so as well.’

  ‘They were Germans,’ said another boy quietly. ‘That plane was a Heinkel.’

  ‘Well, whoever they were, they didn’t deserve to die like that,’ said Mrs Evans.

  ‘Where do you think it landed?’ said Daffyd.

  ‘Hopefully in a field,’ said the other boy. ‘We should see if anyone needs help.’

  ‘I should think they are past all help,’ said Mr Evans. ‘I don’t think you should go out there, Gerraint, you don’t know what you might find.’

  ‘I’ll be careful,’ said the boy.

  Gerraint seemed to be the leader of the group. He got up and moved towards the entrance, and the rest of us followed.

  When we got out
side we could see thick smoke and flames billowing up beyond the trees. People had started running towards it. Gerraint turned to us. ‘I think you should stay here,’ he said. ‘God knows what we are going to find over there.’

  A police car came roaring down the street and screeched to a halt outside the bakery. A policeman got out and started yelling at people to stay back. ‘Leave this to the professionals,’ he shouted.

  ‘God help us, Glyn Thomas, if we left everything to you,’ said Mrs Evans. ‘What took you so long to get here, anyway?’

  ‘I was sitting down to my dinner, Mrs Evans.’

  ‘And I’m sure you had every morsel eaten before you got in your car.’

  ‘You know how Alice feels about wasting food.’

  Mrs Evans folded her arms and glared at him. ‘There are times, Glyn Thomas, when I wonder what ever possessed you to become a policeman.’

  ‘I had a calling, Mrs Evans.’

  ‘I doubt that, but you’re here now so do your job, man.’

  ‘I’m on my way.’

  Mrs Evans looked in the car window at the other policeman. ‘And your sidekick?’

  ‘His wife gave him a sandwich to keep him going.’

  Mrs Evans raised her eyebrows and stalked into the shop. ‘God give me strength,’ she said over her shoulder.

  ‘Best get the job done, Glyn,’ said Mr Evans. ‘I’ll come with you. Gerraint, you come too.’

  ‘What about the rest of us, Mr Evans?’ said Daffyd.

  ‘You stay here – and it wouldn’t hurt to say a few prayers, because I think it will need the Almighty’s intervention to save these poor souls.’

  Me and Lottie walked home, both of us lost in our own thoughts. The war had come to Glengaryth and we were both shaken by what had happened.

  ‘You just don’t know what’s going to happen next, do you? I miss my parents, Nell, I really miss them.’

  It was hard to see Lottie like this; she was always so sure of herself. She had an answer for everything, but this terrible thing had affected her badly. It made her seem more human somehow, a bit more like the rest of us.

  I held her hand. ‘My dad used to say that sometimes bad things happen to good people and there is nothing you can do about it. He said sometimes you just have a bad day.’

  ‘I wonder what they are like,’ said Lottie. ‘I wonder how old they are. I wonder if they have a girlfriend or a wife waiting for them.’

  ‘Or children,’ I said.

  ‘Their families will never know, will they? They’re going to spend the rest of their lives hoping one day the door will open and they will come back to them. I think that’s the saddest bit of all,’ said Lottie, ‘not knowing, always waiting.’

  ‘I think I’d know,’ I said. ‘I think I’d know if someone I loved was dead.’

  ‘Do you know what, Nell?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘You’re the first person besides my parents that I’ve ever been able to talk to like this. Thank you for being my friend.’

  We stopped walking and just stood there in the lane wrapped in each other’s arms, crying our hearts out. That was how Uncle Dylan and Auntie Beth found us.

  ‘Thank God you’re both all right,’ said Auntie Beth, running up to us.

  ‘It was bloody awful,’ said Lottie.

  ‘But you’re safe now,’ said Uncle Dylan. ‘You’re safe.’

  The two German pilots were buried in the little graveyard in Glengaryth. Nearly everyone in the village turned out, only a few stayed away. The service was a simple one. We sang hymns and we prayed for the two young men who had lost their lives fighting for their country. We prayed for the families who had lost their loved ones and would never know what had happened to them. Everything had been burned, so there was nothing to tell us who they were, but they were given a Christian burial and the village paid tribute to two men who were someone else’s sons but who deserved to be laid to rest with dignity and compassion. And that’s what the people of Glengaryth did that day.

  Chapter Eleven

  Mum still hadn’t come and I didn’t know why. There was nothing to keep her in Bermondsey, she would be safe here and so would Tony and the baby. I wrote to her, urging her to come soon. A couple of weeks later, she sent a letter. Olive was at the sweetshop with Aggie so I took the letter upstairs. I sat on the bed and started to read.

  * * *

  Dear Nell,

  I know I promised you that I would come to Wales but I can’t.

  I’ve thought about it a lot and I want to stay here, Nell, in our home. I know this is not what you want to hear and I’m truly sorry. Freddie is a lovely baby, you would love him and so would Olive. He looks a bit like Tony except his hair is more the colour of Olive’s, but he isn’t strong like the rest of you and I just want to take care of him here, in surroundings that I know, with people who will look out for us. You know how good everyone is in the flats. We all pull together and help each other out. I know Tony should have gone with you the day you left and it was wrong of him to run home the way he did, but he is a great help to me, Nell. In fact, I don’t know what I would do without him.

  It helps to know how happy you and Olive are at the vicarage and how kind Mr and Mrs Morgan have been to you both. Your safety and happiness mean everything to me.

  Keep writing to me, Nell, I love getting your letters.

  Your loving mother

  xxx

  * * *

  I ran downstairs and showed the letter to Auntie Beth. She sat down at the table and read it.

  ‘I don’t know what to say, Nell. She seems to have made up her mind, doesn’t she?’

  I felt angry – she’d promised, and we wouldn’t have left if we’d known she wasn’t going to join us. ‘But why?’ I said. ‘She knows they will all be safer here. All she has to do is get on a bloody train, that’s all she has to do – how difficult can it be? Freddie would get strong, I know he would, and Tony would get used to it here. It doesn’t make any sense.’

  ‘I tend to agree with you, Nell. Would it help if I wrote to her?’

  ‘Would you?’

  ‘Of course, I’ll do it right away.’

  ‘Please tell her how lovely it is here and tell her there’s no smog, just fresh air that will make Freddie strong.’

  ‘I’ll be sure to tell her all those things, Nell.’

  I wandered outside. I felt so angry. Mum had always told us that a promise was a binding thing, that a man was judged by his word. She said that if you promised to do something then you must always stick to it, unless there was something stopping you that was out of your control, and now here she was, breaking her promise. I walked around the side of the house to the orchard and sat down against a tree. Maybe she didn’t miss us as much as she said she did, maybe Tony and Freddie were enough for her, maybe she didn’t care. I closed my eyes tightly as angry tears ran down my face. But it didn’t take long for me to come to my senses. What was I thinking? Of course Mum loved us, of course she missed us, so that left only one conclusion: something was stopping her, something that was preventing her from leaving Bermondsey, and I had a feeling it wasn’t Freddie.

  * * *

  A couple of weeks later, I was surprised to see Uncle Dylan and Auntie Beth waiting for us at the school gate.

  ‘I thought we’d go for a milkshake, Olive,’ said Uncle Dylan, ‘just you and me. Would you like that?’

  ‘I’d like that a lot, Uncle Mister. Can Nell come too?’

  ‘Nell and Auntie Missus have women’s business to attend to.’

  ‘Okay,’ said Olive.

  I watched Olive and Uncle Dylan walk away. I was puzzled; I couldn’t think what women’s business we had to attend to.

  Auntie Beth took my hand and said, ‘Let’s walk, shall we, Nell?’

  I now had a feeling of dread in my stomach: something wasn’t right. I just knew it. ‘There’s something wrong, isn’t there?’ I said.

  ‘I heard back from your mum, Nell.’


  ‘Is it Freddie?’

  ‘No, my darling.’

  ‘Tony?’

  She shook her head. ‘I’m afraid it’s your father.’

  I thought I was going to be sick. ‘He’s not dead, is he? My daddy’s not dead?’

  ‘He’s missing, Nell.’

  ‘What does that mean?’

  ‘It means they don’t know where he is.’ Auntie Beth took hold of my hands. ‘It doesn’t mean he’s dead.’

  ‘Where the bloody hell is he then?’

  ‘He could be injured, he could be in a hospital somewhere. Lots of people go missing in the war and lots of them make their way home.’

  Tears were streaming down my cheeks. ‘He’s not dead, I’d know if he was dead.’

  Auntie Beth took a hankie out of her pocket and very gently wiped away my tears.

  ‘That’s the real reason your mum is staying in London. She wants to be there when your daddy comes home.’

  ‘She didn’t tell me the truth then?’

  ‘I think she was trying to spare you the worry.’

  ‘Yeah, she would. Auntie Beth?’

  ‘Yes, dear?’

  ‘Promise you won’t tell Olive.’

  ‘Of course, dear.’

  ‘She’s too young to be told something like that.’

  ‘Would you like to go to the church and light a candle for him, Nell?’

  I nodded and we walked up the lane towards the church.

  It was cool inside – the only warmth was the sun coming through the long window over the altar. Auntie Beth knelt down, closed her eyes and joined her hands in prayer. I knelt beside her, but I couldn’t pray. My mind was a jumble of thoughts. Mum held great store by St Anthony, the saint of lost things. Once we lost one of Olive’s shoes and she couldn’t go to school so we all prayed to St Anthony and we found the shoe under the bed, then went down to the church and lit a penny candle to his statue and thanked him. Mum said when something is lost, it doesn’t mean that it is lost forever, it’s out there waiting to be found. I had to find him, I had to find my daddy. That’s what I had to do, but where was I supposed to look? I couldn’t think straight. Was he in Germany? Was that where he was? I wanted to go there right away and search every inch of that foreign land and bring him home. Maybe his boat sank – was he in some deep grey ocean, all on his own? He could be anywhere, but one thing I was sure of was that he wasn’t dead. I’d know if he was dead – that’s what I’d told Lottie and that’s what I believed. If my daddy was dead something inside me would have died too and it hadn’t: he was alive and he would come home.