War Brides

by Helen Bryan

  “Mrs. Pigeon, this time you really must listen! It’s not a question of whether war is coming but when, possibly a matter of days. Registration is absolutely vital for all London children so they can be evacuated to a safe place, out of reach of the enemy. But because you refused to register your children, your neighbors followed your example. There are nearly forty children in this street alone. Once the war starts it will be dangerous, if not impossible, for them to travel. The government believes the docks in the east end will be the Germans’ first target in London. That’s very near North Street. Any bombs in this area are likely to hit the gasworks, and if that explodes, everything here will disappear in a fireball. The Germans are also expected to use poison gas. It is vital to get the children to safety in time, Mrs. Pigeon, before they burn to death—”

  “Oi, Mum!” There was a chorus of wails, and Mrs. Pigeon turned to quell her brood with a frown.

  The lady seized the initiative while Mrs. Pigeon’s back was turned and handed Violet a boiled sweet, which Violet popped into her mouth. People often gave Violet a sweet, and Violet had learned that the best way to get another was to smile angelically. “What a lovely little girl! And a little girl with such pretty blue eyes must be a very good little girl. What is your name, dear? Do you know your name?” The lady held out another sweet.

  Violet took it, stuffed it into her cheek as well, and smiled beatifically on cue. “Vi’let.”

  The lady quickly made a note on her clipboard. “And do you know how old you are, Violet?”

  Violet stuck a grubby finger into her mouth to poke the sweets and shook her head. Probably three, the lady wrote. “Do you have brothers and sisters, Violet?”

  Violet nodded. “Can you tell me their names, darling? I’ll just stay here while I write them down.” Mrs. Pigeon turned back, her face like a thundercloud. One of the children nudged another. They waited expectantly.

  Violet removed a wet finger from her mouth and confided, “Elsie’s cookin’ her clothes, we’se ’avin’ ’em for our dinner. Mum says ain’t nuffink else to sell.”

  Mrs. Pigeon sighed, defeated. She put Violet down. Without giving an inch at the doorway, she began to name all of the children and their ages. “There’s me eldest, that’s Bert, who’s seventeen, an’ ’is brother, Terence, who’s sixteen. They was taken on at the docks like their dad was before ’is accident. Bit of luck that was, with jobs so scarce nowadays. Me ’usband’s leg got crushed under a load and never mended properly, so with ’im poorly I ’ad a right job to manage until the lads found work. But they’re good lads, steady, bring their wages ’ome. We can’t do without them wages, missus. My Elsie there’s fifteen, finished school and all, she ’as. She’ll be goin’ out to work. My ’usband’s got ’er a place in the glue factory. She starts next week. We can do with her wages as well, keep a roof over our ’eads, all these mouths to feed. Agnes there, she’s ten. She’s a sickly child. We’ve ’ad the doctor out twice this year for ’er and I don’t know ’ow she’s to go nowhere. She can’t ’ardly leave the chair. Them’s the twins, Dick and Willie. They’re eight an’ full of mischief. That’s Jem,” Mum finished, as a baby started to cry. “My youngest.”

  “Mum!” There was a chorus from the dingy room behind her.

  “You lot best keep still if you know what’s good for you!” she warned. She sounded sullen, like she did when forced to do something she didn’t want to think about, like the time she pawned her wedding ring to Uncle for the rent money. Mum turned back to the door and although she and the lady lowered their voices, they sounded like they were arguing.

  Elsie frowned at the visitor, sympathizing with her mother. Everyone knew not to call on a Monday, with all of them wrapped in bits and pieces of Mum’s old aprons and other scraps to keep them decent while their clothes dried. Elsie herself, in a ragged gray petticoat, stirred the wash pot with the broom handle, shoving the rags stained by her monthlies down under the gray suds before her brothers saw them and asked what they were. Dick and Willie, each in a pair of Mum’s old drawers they had to hold up with one hand, were fighting over a broken ha’penny top with the other. Their noise had woken Jem, who had been sleeping in a drawer on the dresser. Agnes was huddled under a blanket on the one armchair, whining that the steam and the smell of boiling soap made her cough, but everything made Agnes cough, and mostly the family took no notice.

  Violet hadn’t been given another sweet and began to shriek loudly for Mum’s attention. The lady said, “Good morning, then,” rather crossly, and Mum shut the door hard. She turned round with a strange look on her face. “Bloody Germans! Bloody la-di-da. Blackout if you please! Blackout curtains, they say! Curtains! And nuffink in the house but potatoes for dinner—and few enough of them—and the lads and your father home to I don’t know what for their tea. Willie, stop larkin’ about and get Jem for me, there’s a good lad.”

  “Cor! Mum said ‘bloody!’” Astonished, the twins stopped fighting. Their mother was a stickler for “proper.”

  Willie picked up the baby and made a face. He held the squalling baby at arm’s length. “’E’s weed over everythink, Mum.”

  Mrs. Pigeon put down Violet, whipped off the wet nappy, and wrapped the baby’s damp bottom in her apron. “Who was that lady? What’s that paper say then, Mum?”

  She held the paper up to the light. Her lips moved as she laboriously spelled out the words. “Ev-a-somefink. What’s that when it’s at home?” she muttered. Violet whimpered and reached up to be carried. Mum put Jem on the table that stood in the middle of the room and picked up Violet again. The baby began to howl. “Oh, for pity’s sake, Agnes, stop coughin’ for a minute, do! ’Ere, Elsie, you’re the clever one, read us what it says.” She handed Elsie the paper and began to look for a clean nappy. Violet’s blue eyes stared at Elsie over her mother’s shoulder.

  Mrs. Pigeon put Violet down, then unbuttoned her top to feed the screaming baby. “Read it to me,” she commanded. “Agnes, you peel them potatoes naow!”

  Violet stuck out her tongue at the baby.

  “Why can’t Elsie ever do it?” wheezed Agnes, but dragged herself to the tiny scullery under the stairs and came back with a tin washbasin and a bowl of potatoes.

  “Because the less Elsie has to do with the dinner, the better it will be, as you well know, my girl. Them potatoes’ll be peeled to shreds. Besides, she’ll be the only one of us can make sense of whatever it is, seein’ as ’ow you’ve been too bad to go to school and the twins can’t no more read than Jem.” Mum tapped the paper the lady had given her. “Tell us what it says then, girl.”

  Elsie sat down and smoothed the paper on the rickety oilcloth-covered table, and read out slowly, “Government Eva…evacu-a-tion Scheme: To ensure the safety of London’s children the government has ordered their evacuation to areas outside London considered not to be at risk from the threat of German bombs. Schoolchildren up to the age of fifteen should be registered at their schools, which will oversee their evacuation to locations in the countryside. If your children are not registered and you wish them to be evacuated, the teachers or school keeper will help you. If you do not wish your children to be evacuated you must not send them to school until further notice.”

  Mrs. Pigeon didn’t say anything so Elsie read the notice a few more times, mimicking the radio voice of the lady in the hat. Hoity-toity. “Evacuation.” The word had an important, official ring to it.

  “Oi, Mum, wot’s the lady in the ’at say it was?” asked Willie, none the wiser.

  Big square woman though she was, Mrs. Pigeon looked smaller suddenly, her shoulders drooping. Her thin hair was straggling down from beneath the knotted kerchief she tied it up in on wash days. When she finally spoke, her voice sounded as if it were coming from a distance. “It means—it means goin’ away, like. They say there’s goin’ to be a war and the ’Uns’ll come bombin’ like they did in the Great War. Awful, that was.” She rocked Jem. “’Orrible. The fires round ’ere burned and burned. I remem
ber ’ouses and shops an’ all’d collapse with people still inside, whole families trapped. And the smell, people burnin’…and the screamin.’ …’Orrible it was. They couldn’t get ’em out, you see. She came round ’ere twice before, askin’ ’ow many of you was under fifteen. ‘Well, I can’t ’ardly bear to think of it ’appenin’ all over again,’ I says to ’er. ‘It can’t,’ I says to ’er. ‘But it will,’ she says, certain as anyfink. ‘I fink you can count on it, Mrs Pigeon.’

  “And she says I’d go with Jem and Vi’let, as they’re so young, but it might be they’d have put us in a different place to the rest of you. But that’d mean leaving your dad and the boys ’ere. An’ Elsie, I said you was fifteen, ’cause you are, nearly, but that’s too old to be evacu-wossname. I don’t know what to do for the best.”

  Elsie discovered something on the back of the notice. “Mum, there’s even a list. It says ’ere, ‘Children must bring their gas masks in case.’ Ugh! ’Orrible! I ’ate wearin’ it! And they need ‘two changes of underwear, a nightdress or pajamas’—what’s pajamas, then, Mum? And ‘a bar of soap, toothbrush, toothpaste, a towel, a comb and brush, ’andkerchiefs, a warm coat and jumper, a change of socks or stockings, a spare pair of shoes.’”

  “Each, the lady says,” said her mother blankly. Elsie did the mental arithmetic to figure how many bars of soap, how many combs and brushes, how many jumpers would be required, and put down the impossible list with relief. “That fixes it then, Mum. None of us can go. We don’t ’ave spare shoes or them other things.”

  There was a moment’s silence. Mum looked at the circle of anxious faces. There wasn’t one of them she felt she could do without for a minute.

  “’Ow ’ot is fire, then?” asked Willie. “We can keep a bucket of water by the door.”

  “I’m not afraid of no fire,” said Dick stoutly. “Nor ’Uns.”

  “Fire,” said Violet and stuck her finger in her mouth.

  A bell clanged in the street and a cart rumbled past.

  “Wish we ’ad some sausages, though,” said Dick, who was always hungry. The others nodded.

  Mum looked up. “Them potatoes want boilin’. Agnes, you chop up that bit of cabbage left from yesterday. That bell will be the cat’s-meat man. I’ll get us some bits before them cats ’ave it all. We want a bit of cheerin’ up. We’ll ’ave it with onion gravy. And we’ve some mustard powder—we could do with a bit of mustard to perk us up. Elsie, you mix up the mustard.”

  “No! Elsie makes it lumpy, Mum.”

  Mrs. Pigeon sighed wearily. “Elsie, wrap a towel round you and get that washin’ out on the line. Jem’s no dry nappies left.” She untied her kerchief, having extracted a precious shilling from the rent money that was hidden there, and reknotted it tight on her forehead.

  Out in the street Penelope Fairfax repinned her hat and bit her lip in frustration. She had personally called on Mrs. Pigeon more than once because the woman’s neighbors had asked, “And what do the Pigeons say about it all, missus?” and refused to evacuate their children until they knew.

  At the thought of the Pigeons Penelope wrinkled her nose. The smell in the house had been terrible, not quite masked by the fug of boiling yellow soap. Those two scrawny little boys had scabies, she was sure of it. The child with the cough didn’t sound at all well, and Penelope had been relieved when Mrs Pigeon wouldn’t let her in. The one they called Violet was a pretty little thing, though. Lovely eyes. Unusual to see a child like that on North Street. She probably had lice in her head like the rest. Or worms. Or both.

  And endless numbers of such children needed to be evacuated from cities all over the country, while the billeting authorities were desperately short of places for them. Penelope thought guiltily of her own spacious house in Crowmarsh Priors. She would have been happy to turn it over to Richard and darling Alice, then move to London, but had felt obliged to remain in the country to help Evangeline—what a name!—settle in, especially as the girl was expecting a baby. But it had proved impossible to share a house with her daughter-in-law, whose lethargy got on her nerves, and she didn’t care to share it with the likes of the Pigeon children either, thank you very much. The very thought of them running amok among the chintz and antiques made her shudder. She congratulated herself on having had the foresight to send the foreign girl and her baby down on the train last week. Now if the authorities learned about her house, she could say that Evangeline had her hands full with evacuees.

  Penelope paid no attention to the slip-slap of carpet slippers behind her on the pavement until she felt her arm clutched from behind. A breathless Mrs. Pigeon, anxiety etched into her face, gasped, “Oi, missus, I didn’t like to ask in front of the kiddies, but what will become of ’em in this eva-wossname? I don’t know what to do for the best, with their father only working casual down the docks, on account of ’is leg, and the two eldest can’t leave their jobs, but I don’t see ’ow I’m to leave them behind to fend for themselves, only lads they are, and there’s me oldest girl, just fifteen, and leavin’ ’er alone at that age without ’er mother ain’t right.”

  Penelope sighed. “Mrs. Pigeon, as I’ve told you already, the government is quite clear that children will be safer outside London. As I explained, they will assemble in the regular way at their schools, and their teachers will accompany each class as they are moved out of London and taken to their billets. You really must put your children first and think what is best for them, as I’m sure you’ll agree. Just sign this form while I see about the arrangements.”

  Wearily Penelope checked her list. Most available billets were already overcrowded, and it was clear that, of those who had signed up for “one nice little girl aged five or six, clean and well behaved,” many would have to be persuaded to cope with “six active boys, aged between two and fourteen” or “two girls and four boys, ages unknown.” But duty was duty. “You have three who could go to the countryside—that would be Agnes and the twin boys. We’ve room for three in—er—Yorkshire. On a farm—terribly healthy, wonderful place for children. You could accompany the two youngest, though it might not be to the same place as the other three as spaces are short. However, there is a billet near Scarborough.” Penelope knew perfectly well that the elderly couple there had specified “a quiet and obedient little girl of nine or ten.” However, they would have to take in Mrs. Pigeon, Violet, and Jem. Perhaps they would warm to Violet, so long as she didn’t howl.

  Mrs. Pigeon looked blank.

  “I’m sure your husband and the two elder boys will fend for themselves somehow. Now, your elder daughter—Elsie, is it? She’s left school? Rather difficult as she falls between the cracks, so to speak. Hmm. Normally we can only billet schoolchildren, but it’s just possible that your Elsie would do as an under-housemaid for a friend of mine in the country. A certain Lady Marchmont. She’s widowed. Quite the backbone of the village.”

  Mum had no idea about Yorkshire and this Scar-place, but at the suggestion Elsie take up a place as a housemaid, her face lit up. Far more “respectable” than a glue factory. “Elsie go into service? Why,” she said, thinking fast, “before my ’usband got ’er the factory place we used to speak of Elsie doin’ just that!”

  Mrs. Pigeon crossed her fingers behind her back. “Course Elsie doesn’t have no trainin’. But, if I say it meself, she don’t ’alf take to trainin’.” She crossed her fingers tighter. Once Elsie was in the country, surely they’d have to keep her. If there was a war.

  A similar thought was passing through Penelope’s mind. She knew Muriel Marchmont well—so well, in fact, that the old lady had taken it upon herself to keep Penelope informed about what Evangeline was, and was not, doing. However, her last letter had mentioned she and Mrs. Gifford were at their wits’ end since the last housemaid had left to be married. It left an opening of sorts for a girl like Elsie. On the other hand, if that lank-haired girl stirring the wash pot knew one end of a duster from another, Penelope was Queen Mary.

  Mrs. Pigeon sensed hesitat
ion and seized her advantage, knowing from experience that advantages rarely came the Pigeons’ way. “Elsie’d be out of ’arm’s way there. She’s a good girl, mind you, is Elsie. But round ’ere you don’t like to leave them on their own at fifteen just when boys try to give them ideas and they get their ’eads turned. It’d be a load off me mind to ’ave her there,” she urged, “so’s I can think about what to do wiv the others. But…” she trailed off, imagination failing her when she tried to see Elsie as an apprentice housemaid, “maybe she wouldn’t suit the lady.”

  “There’s going to be war, Mrs. Pigeon. We will all have to make sacrifices,” said Penelope crisply, noticing the time. She was overdue at Headquarters with her lists. “If I speak to Lady Marchmont personally, I’m sure she will do her part. I shall register Agnes and the twins at once, and let you know tomorrow where you and the two youngest are to go.” She thrust a form and a pen into Mrs. Pigeon’s hand. “Kindly sign here. Now if you will excuse me, I am late.” She snatched the signed form from Mrs. Pigeon and dashed for the waiting WVS car.

  “When are they to go?” Mrs. Pigeon called.

  Penelope turned briefly. “On Friday, end of the week. Remember, at school first thing, packed and ready. And don’t worry, Mrs. Pigeon, we shall all pull together and it will be fine. Cheerio.”

  Mrs. Pigeon’s shoulders slumped. She’d done it. She hoped everything would turn out for the best. Her Elsie would be settled in a respectable household, out of harm’s way, and especially away from that sly boy Bernie that followed Uncle everywhere. She had spotted him hanging about in the street outside their house and suspected he was watching for Elsie. Mrs. Pigeon had learned a thing or two during her own marriage, and she could tell Bernie was a wrong ’un.