Keep the Home Fires Burning

by Anne Bennett

  ‘That’s the kind of men they were – kind and generous, every one of them – and we were laughing and joking just minutes before and then, bang, and five men lay dead.’

  ‘What happened to you?’

  ‘I was a little to the side and that probably saved my life,’ Sam said. ‘I was knocked unconscious, though, and fell into a pit. It was assumed I was dead and might have been if I had lain on the frozen ground much longer. It was the soldier detailed to remove the dog tags from the others that noticed I was breathing. I knew none of this, of course. First I knew, I was in some field hospital wrapped up like a mummy and shouting like a lunatic.’

  ‘Was that because you couldn’t see?’

  ‘I didn’t know I couldn’t see then,’ Sam said. ‘The shrapnel hit my eyes, but there was a lot of blood in and around the eyes and so they had pads on them. No, it was because of the memories pulsating through my brain. It was when they were changing the pads that I realised I couldn’t see either.’

  ‘That must have been a shock.’

  ‘It was. But in a way I felt almost guilty that I had survived. Because I’m blind I can do nothing to fill my time, to try and forget, even for a short time, what has happened. And I’m afraid to go to sleep because of those horrific nightmares. I mean, D-Day, the invasion, was hailed as a success and I know it had to be done, but the cost in human life was colossal.’

  ‘Was it very bad?’

  ‘Bad enough.’

  ‘Tell me?’

  Sam shook his head. ‘No. You don’t want to know.’

  ‘I want to know anything that involves you,’ Sarah said. ‘Don’t you know that?’ And then she grasped his hand tighter and urged gently, ‘Tell me, please?’

  When Sam began to talk about nearing France that morning in the landing craft with the bombers circling overhead and the machine battery pounding them from the beaches, Sarah remembered how her aunt Polly said once he must be an Irishman underneath because he was a born storyteller, and he was doing it again, painting pictures in Sarah’s head.

  She saw in her mind’s eye Allies blown out of the water before they had even reached the beaches their bodies, or sometimes only parts of bodies, floating in the water, one a man that Sam had shared a cigarette with before they had set out. She heard the mournful tone in Sam’s voice as he told her of the planes wheeling and diving, flak flying everywhere as the RAF sought to protect the hundreds of men trying to make their way through the water to the beaches with their guns raised about their heads. They were facing the clatter of machine guns, the booming guns on the ships, the whine of bullets and the crump and crash of the exploding bombs.

  ‘It sounds like hell on earth,’ Sarah said. ‘It must have been dreadful.’

  ‘Maybe I shouldn’t have told you so much.’

  ‘Oh, no. I think that you did exactly the right thing and I feel privileged that you did.’

  ‘I’ve been having those terrible nightmares again recently,’ Sam said. ‘That’s why I’m in a private room, but I suppose Peggy told you this?’

  ‘She did, and I’m not surprised. But now I’m here and you can unburden yourself.’ And she heard Sam sigh as he put his arms around her.

  ‘Your father would never tell me things like that,’ Marion said to Sarah later that evening as they sat around the table and she had told the family where she had been and some of the things Sam had shared with her that afternoon about his impression of D-Day.

  ‘Sam hasn’t got anyone else,’ Sarah said. ‘There is no handy Uncle Pat to take him for a drink.’

  ‘And he would never burden Mom and Dad,’ Peggy said. ‘Nor me either when I only really get to see him on Saturday, and sometimes Sunday when I share him with everyone else.’

  ‘Don’t you mind hearing it all, Sarah?’ Magda asked.

  ‘It is harrowing listening to it,’ she admitted, ‘but then I tell myself that Sam actually experienced it, and that has to be far worse. I am going to write down what he tells me while the memories are still fresh in my mind because he tells them in such a vivid way I could see all he was describing in my head almost like snapshots. I shall try to recapture that style when I write his accounts down because what he has seen and experienced should never be forgotten.’

  The following day, Sarah took a notebook to hospital. Sam was more than pleased to have her visit.

  ‘Ah, Sarah,’ he said with a sigh, and he kissed her lips. ‘You are good for me. I slept like a top last night.’

  ‘That’s maybe because you talked about the things getting between you and sleep.’

  ‘You could be right.’

  ‘Well, it’s just that sharing his troubles helped my father. Uncle Pat took him for a drink and got him to talk about the things haunting him because he wouldn’t discuss them with Mom.’

  ‘And I worry about telling you.’

  ‘Don’t,’ Sarah said reassuringly. ‘I have broad shoulders. Anyway, it was different for Mom because when Dad was better, he had to go back into the fray. You won’t have to. For you, the war is over.’

  ‘I should think it will soon be over for everyone.’ Sam said. ‘We were in Germany by January and it’s the fifth of April today. Anyone but Hitler would have surrendered by now.’

  ‘He’ll never surrender, not him.’

  ‘In a way I hope he doesn’t. Then I’ll take great pleasure in hearing that he has been hanged by the neck from a very long rope.’

  ‘That will please a lot of people,’ Sarah said with a laugh. ‘But how did the ordinary German people treat you when you reached their country?’

  ‘They were very subdued,’ Sam said. ‘Can’t blame them, I suppose. They knew they were on a losing wicket; totally different to the attitude in France …’ And he was off again and Sarah felt as if she were one of the French, lining the streets, cheering a welcome to the advancing Allies freeing them at last.

  ‘There was so much relief,’ Sam said. ‘Some of them were nearly starving. The military handed out chocolates and sweets to the children.’ He smiled. ‘You should have seen their faces. And we had tins of meat for the adults. Those were the good experiences, the ones you keep in your head to remind yourself what you’re fighting for.’

  ‘I can see that.’

  ‘Now, enough of this war talk,’ Sam said. ‘You and I need to talk about things.’

  ‘What sort of things?’

  ‘Well, the first thing is this,’ Sam said, and he slipped off his chair and onto his knees on the floor.

  ‘Sam!’ Sarah cried, alarmed. ‘What are you doing?’

  ‘Damn this blindness,’ Sam said. ‘I’m trying to get on one knee to propose to you and I’m not sure that I’ll be able to balance.’

  ‘Oh, is that all?’ said Sarah, with a giggle as she kneeled down beside him and put her arms around him. ‘That’s the conventional way of doing things. Let’s be a little bit different. Now what did you want to ask me?’

  Even Sam smiled. ‘You are great, Sarah. Do you know that?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Sarah cockily, ‘though it is nice to be told on a fairly regular basis. But I’m sure that wasn’t what you were going to say.’

  ‘No, it wasn’t,’ Sam said with a laugh. Then he said, ‘Sarah Whittaker, will you do me the honour of becoming my wife?’

  ‘Yes, yes, and a thousand times yes,’ Sarah said, and the passion of their first real kiss took them both by surprise and nearly had them both overbalancing onto the floor.

  Flushed and slightly breathless, Sarah helped Sam back on to his seat and he said, ‘I’m not the same religion as yourself. Will that matter?’

  ‘Not to me.’

  ‘But your mother? The priest?’

  ‘Mom has always known you aren’t a Catholic, but I don’t think she sees that as a major problem.’

  ‘Will the priest have something to say?’

  ‘Undoubtedly. He has an opinion on anything and everything, and his views are usually at variance with everybody else’s, b
ut Mom can cope with him. She did it before when Richard missed Mass when he had been out fighting the fires the night before in the Blitz, and she will do it for me. She was more worried about your blindness.’

  ‘Did she think you were throwing your life away, like mine did?’

  ‘Maybe a bit at first,’ Sarah admitted. ‘Though I think she was mainly concerned with how I’d cope and that. But then she said to me that she would much rather I marry a man of my own choosing. That’s when I told her that my life would be nothing without you in it, and then she sort of sent her blessing to both of us.’

  Sam sighed. ‘That’s a big relief. But I still think that we must wait for the war to be over before we can plan our wedding.’

  ‘That could be ages,’ Sarah protested. ‘Why must we?’

  ‘It won’t be that long,’ Sam said. ‘Really, it can’t now, and we must do this right. I must have your father’s permission.’

  ‘We could write to him.’

  ‘We could, but no father worth his salt is going to give a blind serviceman he has never met permission to marry his daughter, especially when there is no reason for haste. It might be different if I were being posted somewhere, but we have all the time in the world.’

  ‘And you have your Captain Sensible hat on.’

  Sam laughed. ‘If you like. One of us has to. And,’ he continued, adopting a mock pompous tone, ‘you still have the impetuousness of youth.’

  ‘Yes, and this impetuous youth might just brain you in a minute.’

  ‘Don’t do that,’ Sam said. ‘This is much nicer,’ and he took hold of Sarah’s hand and pulled her onto his knee, and this time when their lips met it was as if a fire had been lit inside them and they gave themselves up to the pleasure of it.

  Sarah came home ecstatically happy to find that no one was a bit surprised at her news, though Peggy said, ‘Doesn’t mean we are any the less pleased just because it was semi-expected.’ And then she kissed Sarah and added, ‘And there is no one I’d rather have as a sister.’

  ‘And you’ll be good for Sam, and make him happy, because you’re made for one another,’ Violet said.

  ‘I’m so glad that you came to live with us,’ Sarah said, catching up the hands of both girls.

  ‘Many times I have said that,’ Marion said. ‘And we’ll all miss you when you’re gone.’

  ‘We might not be gone very far, though,’ Peggy said.

  ‘I thought you would be going back home?’

  ‘There’s nothing for us there,’ Violet said. ‘Anyroad, we like it here. I mean, I know that we will have to leave the drop forge. There’s little enough to do there now, and the men coming back will likely want their old jobs back And we know too that we’ll be competing with returning servicemen and -women for anything else, but we still think we’ve a better chance of getting something here than back home.’

  ‘The only stumbling block was finding somewhere to stay,’ Peggy said. ‘Then last Sunday, when you were washing up in the kitchen, your dad said we could stay with him,’ Violet said. ‘He has that big attic and that would suit us down to the ground. We’d be company for him too.’

  ‘Oh, you’re right, that would be just perfect!’ Marion cried. She knew that the girls would look after her father as well, and as he got older she did worry about him living alone. ‘But,’ she said, ‘my father’s house is only back-to-back. It opens directly onto the street, but there’s no indoor toilet, and no bathroom at all.’

  Peggy laughed. ‘And what sort of house did you think we had in the country? Lap of luxury, this was to us, when we came here. But whatever job we get we won’t be getting the money we got in the drop forge and so we’d have to find a cheaper place than this. Anyroad, you’ll want your own house back when Bill and Richard come home.’

  ‘Just now, though, we have a wedding to plan,’ Marion said, putting her arm around her daughter. ‘I am so happy for you.’

  ‘Are you really, Mom?’

  ‘Yes,’ Marion said emphatically. ‘That isn’t to say I won’t worry about you, or wish both for your sake and his that Sam wasn’t blind. I won’t tell you either that love conquers all, because it wouldn’t be true. Sometimes marriage has to be worked at. But I will say that neither are you happy apart from one another. You belong together and so I’m happy for both of you.’

  ‘I am so glad about that,’ Sarah said. ‘There is no rush to plan anything, though, because Sam says he has to ask Dad’s permission, and in person.’

  Marion laughed. ‘So why the long face? It’s the way things are done. It just shows that Sam has manners.’

  ‘Mom, we don’t even know when the war will end, never mind when Dad will be demobbed.’

  ‘Well, that’s just the way things are,’ Marion said with a shrug.

  ‘And meanwhile you can write down Sam’s memoirs,’ said Peggy with a laugh.

  ‘Plenty of time to do that, though,’ Sarah said, ‘cos I can’t visit tomorrow.’

  ‘Oh, yes,’ Peggy said. ‘They’re doing some work on his eyes.’

  ‘Seeing if there’s any point in operating, is how Sam put it,’ Sarah said. ‘It’s all to do with how much of the cornea was burned off in the explosion.’

  ‘Nice if he could see something, however slight?’

  ‘It would be great,’ Sarah said. ‘I think he just doesn’t want to get his hopes up.’

  ‘Mind you, you haven’t got many notes written,’ Violet said, skimming through the notebook that Sarah had tossed on the settee.

  ‘I don’t need it really,’ Sarah said. ‘I only take the notebook in case Sam says something specific so that I would be accurate. When Sam is telling me something I become so engrossed that I would probably forget to take notes anyway, but I don’t forget what he says ‘cos it sort of becomes engrained on my mind. Like, the other day, he was telling me about liberating the French towns and that, but today he said outside of the towns the roads are often booby-trapped with land mines, or there could be snipers placed to pick them off one by one.

  ‘Just before the explosion he was talking to one man who was really shaken up. He was a despatch rider. They have motor bikes and are used like scouts to check the roads and areas ahead, often working in twos. Well, this man and his mate were riding along through a German forest and, before retreating, the Germans had stretched thin wire between two trees on either side of the road and it had sliced this man’s mate’s head clean off. He managed to duck in time.’

  ‘Ugh, that’s horrible.’

  ‘It is, and not likely to be easily forgotten.’

  ‘So are you going to write that down?’

  ‘Yeah,’ Sarah said. ‘I’m going to write down everything he tells me as long as he doesn’t mind.’

  When Sam told Sarah and Peggy that the doctor said there was no point in doing any operation or further treatment for his eyes, Sarah was sad for him and thought it was wise of him not to have raised his hopes up. Peggy, however, knew her brother well and guessed that wasn’t the whole story, but that he would say nothing unless she got him on her own.

  He was tickled pink, however, that Sarah had written down the things he had told her about.

  ‘So you don’t mind at all?’ Sarah asked.

  ‘Mind? Why should I mind? I think it’s a jolly good idea to have some form of record. One day I hope we might have children. If my son should ask me what I did in the war I can show him what you’ve written down. No, you go ahead with it if you want to.’

  Sarah was glad to hear that assurance from Sam though his reference to children embarrassed her a little in front of Peggy. But she told herself not to be so silly and the rest of the visit passed off really well. Peggy thought Sam nearly back to his old self and, despite his blindness, looked better than she had ever seen him. She left about fifteen minutes before the end of visiting time to give Sam and Sarah time alone, but she still wondered what the doctor had actually said to Sam. There had been no opportunity to ask him, and she never got mu
ch time with him on Sundays. She would have to have patience but she was determined to get the truth out of him at the first opportunity.

  The doctor popped in to see Sam that day just after the women left, and he picked up the handwritten pages Sarah had left and asked what they were.

  ‘Sarah asked me to talk about my war experiences when my sister told her about those horrific nightmares and flashbacks I was having,’ Sam said. ‘She thought it might help because when her father was traumatised after being rescued from Dunkirk, talking his experience through with a relative eased his nightmares.’

  ‘Well, something has helped yours, all right,’ the doctor said, ‘because they were becoming a nightly, sometimes a twice nightly, experience and you haven’t had one at all for a few days.’

  Sam grinned. ‘I know. I’ve been sleeping like the proverbial baby.’

  ‘I’m glad you made it up with your girl anyway,’ the doctor said. ‘You had words, didn’t you?’

  ‘How do you know that?’

  ‘Oh, no secrets here,’ the doctor said. ‘Some of the others on the ward told one of the nurses, and they told me.’

  ‘Well, it was me being stupid,’ Sam said. ‘And I was so miserable without her that I often wished I had died alongside my companions. It was Sarah writing to me that brought me to my senses and now I have asked her to marry me and she said yes.’

  ‘Oh, congratulations,’ said the doctor. ‘That’s wonderful news.’ And he remembered Sam’s sister saying that the girl that Sam had once thrown over would not care a whit that he was blind. It seemed she was absolutely right.

  ‘Course, we can’t make plans to marry yet,’ Sam said. ‘I want to do the job right and ask her father’s permission, and he’s in the Forces.’

  ‘Will he give it?’

  Sam made a face. ‘I don’t know. He’s bound to have misgivings, as any father would, and that’s another reason why I want to become as independent as possible before I leave here. Being blind is a bugger, and I don’t want Sarah having to run around after me. I want a wife, not a nursemaid, and I want her father to see that too. As to the future, well, I don’t know what’s going to happen there.’