Jubilee (Book 1 of The Poppy Chronicles)

by Claire Rayner

  But no one seemed to notice for the train had stopped at a long crowded platform, and Auntie Jessie seized her by the elbow so that she had to pull one hand out of her muff, and then held on to her, walking fast, with Mama walking equally quickly on the other side, and also holding her hand, so that she had to trot between them with her muff bouncing up and down and hitting her chin as she ran. It was all very disagreeable, especially as the smell of steam and soot was even stronger now and the noise was dreadful; loud whistles and hoots from the great trains that were in the station, and people shouting and talking and carts rattling and jingling. Poppy became more and more miserable.

  It became a little better when they got out of the station and into the open air. It was a cold day, blustery and chill, and that made Poppy take a deep breath and it helped. The chocolate, which had taken to hovering somewhere just beneath her chin, seemed to go down a little further to where it ought to be and that helped a lot, and she pulled one hand away from Mama and said, ‘Please – I can’t run any more –’

  ‘We’re going too fast for her,’ Jessie said, full of compunction, and bent down and swept her up and settled her against her big shoulder. ‘Come on dolly, I’ll carry you for a while. All right? But we must be quick. We have to find out where we have to go and there just isn’t much time. The sooner we find him, the sooner we can all go home –’

  It was nicer not to have to run to keep up with Mama and Auntie Jessie; not nice to be bounced so much, but she held on to her hat with one hand and her muff with the other and shut her mouth tightly to keep the chocolate in its place and stared at all she saw.

  People, people everywhere, all running in the same direction. Ahead of her she could see little but high buildings and tall cranes and ropes and carts and horses – a great tangle of things and activities that bewildered her, until Auntie Jessie said breathlessly, ‘Isn’t that a ship? There – Look – they said to me the station let you right out by the docks – isn’t that a big ship?’

  ‘I can see the name, at the side –’ Mama said, and Poppy looked in the same direction Mama was and saw the writing high on the side of what she had thought was one of the buildings. ‘Or – ORIENT,’ she said and Jessie laughed and said, ‘Ain’t she a one? Reading it like that, so easy?’ And she turned her head and spoke to a man who was walking purposefully alongside them in the same direction.

  ‘Hey, Mister – that ship there – the Orient – that the one going to South Africa with the soldiers and General Buller?’

  The man was small and rather thin, and next to Auntie Jessie, Poppy thought privately, looked very silly. He was wearing a shiny black suit and a collar so high he could hardly turn his head, and a round billycock hat and he had a clay pipe between his broken teeth. He took the pipe out of his mouth with great deliberation and swivelled his eyes sideways so that he could look at Jessie.

  ‘All the ships is orf to Sarf Africa, lidy, on account there’s this ’ere war on. Don’t you know nothin?’

  ‘I know well enough not to need to be told by you,’ Jessie said smartly. ‘All I want to know is whether that is General Buller’s ship. If you know say so, if not bite your tongue.’

  ‘Manners, manners!’ said the little man loftily. ‘That there is not General Sir Redvers Buller’s ship, as any idiot well knows. That there is another ship called the Orient what sails this morning very soon, wiv some soldiers but mostly wiv ordinary passengers – lot of these ’ere Sarf Africans wot have bin visitin’ ’ere scuttlin’ back. Not Boers, mind you. We ain’t got none o’ them ’ere – but Sarf Africans, wot’s really English, or was. There’s another ship over there, the Dunottar Castle what is orf later on wiv the General an’ ’is forces. It’s a fair walk away, bein’ as it’s a different dock, but if it’s General Buller as you wants to talk to, it’s over there you’d better go. I dare say you’ve got an appointment, like?’

  ‘Of course!’ Jessie said loftily and swerved so that Mildred had to change her tack too, and began heading in the direction the little man had indicated.

  ‘Cocky devil –’ Jessie muttered. ‘Talkin’ to me like that! An’ why isn’t he in uniform, I want to know, instead of wagging his tongue at the families of those that are?’

  ‘Are you sure we ought to pay any attention to him?’ Mildred asked, as they pushed their way through the still thickening crowds. ‘Perhaps we should find someone more – someone in a uniform who would be more likely to know.’

  ‘He seemed definite enough –’ Jessie said doubtfully and then shook her head vigorously. ‘Look, he was right! There’s the other one – can you see? Right over there. And I can see soldiers – look!’

  And indeed there were soldiers, a great many of them, marching in serried ranks to the ragged beat of a band that was blowing and beating away industriously on instruments that blinked cheerfully in the fitful morning sunshine; and the two women hurried after it, trying to get in front of the marching men so that they could turn and see their faces.

  Poppy, clinging dizzily to Auntie Jessie’s shoulders, tried to see what was going on around her as the scene bounced and swayed with each of Auntie Jessie’s vigorous steps, and saw the soldiers, men all in brown with big round white hats with what seemed like buttons on the top, and turned down brims, and loads on their backs that seemed to be very heavy and lots of shiny leather straps round them. They wore breeches like the coalman did, only instead of having string tied round below their knees they had gaiters, and looked, as far as Poppy could tell, very pleased to be wearing such strange clothes. Some of them were singing as they marched along, carrying their long rifles over their shoulders and all round them there were people waving and cheering. And crying. All the women Poppy could see were crying, sometimes wiping their eyes with their handkerchiefs and sometimes waving with them, and that made Poppy feel she wanted to cry too. Seeing other people, especially grown-ups, in tears always made her throat and chest feel very tight.

  The chocolate reminded her again that it was still inside her and for a moment she wanted to cry out to Auntie Jessie to set her down, because she felt sick, but she was now running with Mama alongside her and it would have been impossible to make her hear in all the hubbub that was going on around them, so Poppy bit her lips and held on more tightly than ever.

  The music got louder and more cacophonous as they came closer to the ship, for there was another band on the other side of the dock playing a totally different tune as more soldiers came marching towards the SS Dunottar Castle from their side of the dock. Somewhere high above them some men had climbed up a crane and were unfurling a banner on which they had scrawled in uneven black letters, ‘Pull old Kroojer’s whiskers!’ and there were other people clinging to the same crane, as well as to several others, waving Union Jacks in a frenzy of excited patriotism as up the gangplanks of the great ship brown snakes of marching soldiers moved sluggishly.

  By this time Jessie and Mildred, with Poppy still perched high on her aunt’s shoulder, had reached the centre of the crowd of shouting, waving onlookers and could get no closer. Jessie was craning her head in an effort to see the faces of the men now marching towards the gangplanks in ever increasing numbers, and Mildred was doing the same, but for all that she had the advantage of greater height, she could see little, for they were surrounded by a forest of waving arms and flags and handkerchiefs and banners.

  ‘This is crazy –’ Mildred shouted in Jessie’s ear. ‘We can’t hope to see him or anyone else in this. We ought to try to find someone who is in charge, give his name, see if anyone knows of him. Someone must have such information somewhere –’

  ‘If you can get any closer, then do –’ Jessie roared back. ‘I’ll stick here – hey, lady, move that great head of yours – you’re not the only one, you know –’ And she pushed hard against the woman in front of her, who was wearing a vast plate of a hat with so many feathers and fruits on it that it was impossible to see space between them, and the woman shouted back at her and shoved with her
shoulder, and Poppy, now thoroughly frightened, began to wail.

  ‘Out,’ Mildred said with determination and pulled on Jessie’s arm and they began to inch away sideways, and for some reason that was much easier, for people seemed willing to let them through that way, and gradually, with Mildred leading, the three of them moved crabwise along the dock, going by slow degrees further and further forwards. Jessie, once she realized what was happening, co-operated enthusiastically, and soon, though buffeted by noise and people, they were a great deal closer to the sides of the ship and one of the gangplanks than would have seemed possible just fifteen minutes before.

  Poppy had stopped crying and was holding on as hard as ever, and still feeling queasy, but knew she had no hope of attracting the attention of her mother or her aunt, close as they were there below her. They seemed to have been swept up by the tide of excitement that swirled round the great ship and to be pushing and shoving their way towards it as though reaching it were a goal in its own right, and not merely a means to an end. But now they were there and could look up at the ship and actually see faces, some of the excitement that had buoyed them both up seemed to diminish and Poppy felt Jessie’s shoulders sag a little beneath her.

  ‘It’s absurd,’ Mildred said, and she no longer had to shout so loudly, now they were a greater distance from both the sweating, thumping bands. ‘How can you think to recognize one man in such a hubbub of men? And all dressed alike – it’s ridiculous –’

  ‘At least we’re trying,’ Jessie said. ‘Not to try is the worst thing in the world – and anyway – listen, I’m going to try to get on.’

  ‘On the ship? They’ll never let you –’

  ‘Well, like I said, it’s worth a try. Here, take Poppy –’ And she reached up and heaved at Poppy and brought her down to the ground.

  The great swooping movement was too much for Poppy. She had been trying manfully for a very long time to hold on to herself, had kept pushing the intrusive chocolate down inside her every time it threatened to raise itself too high, but now, all around her dazzled as she stood on the dock and the chocolate, with what seemed like a cry of triumph, leapt into her throat. And suddenly she was copiously and explosively sick.

  At once both Mildred and Jessie bent to help her, and Mama held her head as Jessie lifted her and held her horizontal so that she was at no risk of soiling herself, and the people who were around them pushed away and scattered, as people always do in such circumstances, so that the three of them were there in a tiny space of their own, and Poppy, her head swimming and her eyes pouring helpless tears, went on and on miserably retching, feeling as though now it had started it would never stop.

  As the two women went on tending to the child the music of the bands changed their rhythm and became more determinedly cheerful with the latest rag tune, and the tails of the snakes on the gangplanks disappeared into the gaping maws on the sides of the ship and the gangplanks were slowly and noisily drawn up and away. The maws closed as crewmen inside the ship clanged the great metal plates into position and there was a renewed burst of cheering and waving from the crowds on the dock.

  ‘It’s too late,’ Mildred was holding Poppy now, well mopped and lying against her mother with her head on her shoulder and Jessie looked back as they moved away from the unfortunate evidence of Poppy’s indisposition and stared upwards.

  The ship was now sealed, and above them at the rails faces peered down and arms waved as the soldiers returned the greetings being offered to them from the shore. There was a great deal of activity at the bow of the ship as men scurried with ropes and cables and slowly, slowly, the great mass of metal and humanity moved away from the side of the dock, turning ponderously, as another wave of sound went up from the people below.

  ‘Yes,’ Jessie said. ‘Too late.’ And she stood there and watched as with infinite slowness the gap between the ship and the shore widened.

  * * *

  He’d found a place on the port side, up near the forward section and had held on to it in spite of a good deal of pushing from other blokes, eager to see their wives and families below, standing there with his shoulders braced against the pressure and staring downwards. So what that he had no one to wave to? Why shouldn’t he stay there? Hadn’t he got there first? In this world no one else would look after you if you didn’t, he told himself, and in this army it’s going to be the bloody same. And he pushed away the thought that had been clamouring at him more and more this past week; that he had made a dreadful, dreadful mistake. However boracic he was, however much in trouble with Jack Long’s lot and whatever debts he had to deal with, nothing was worth giving up his freedom for, and it was obvious that that was what he had done. Ever since he’d arrived late last night at the embarkation barracks and drawn his kit and been given his orders he’d known that. And now he stood morosely at the rail on this stinking troopship with nothing but three weeks of sea sickness and hard tack to look forward too, and Gawd alone knew what after that. Joining the army might seem like a good idea to some, but once you’d done it, you knew what a shlemiel you’d been.

  Far below in the crowd, quite near the gangplank up which the last stragglers were now marching, he saw a little flurry of activity and he leaned forwards to see more clearly, not because it mattered but for want of something better to look at. It was impossible to see any details of the people down there, for at this distance their faces were blurred, but he could see a woman in a dark red gown and a great hat, and a child wearing a white hat thrown back onto her shoulders and as he watched he saw the people around them move back quickly and raggedly as though they had been pushed, leaving the little group in the middle of a clear space, and then he laughed. The child seemed to be casting up its accounts good and proper. That’s put some of those old trouts down there in a good two and eight, he thought. Honestly, it’s as good as being in the gallery at the old Britannia and watching the idiots right at the bottom getting upset over someone who can’t hold his drink – and at the thought of the old Brit and the dear old days there he became even more morose and shoved his shoulder more roughly at the man behind him who was pushing so hard to see over his head that his rifle was digging into his back.

  ‘Here,’ he growled, looking over his shoulder at him. ‘You want to start something? Just remember if you do as I’m a champion boxer, all right? And I don’t like being shoved.’ And he returned his attention to the dockside, which was now moving slowly away from them as the engines deep below his feet churned and thumped and gouts of black smoke began to appear in the huge funnels behind him. He could hardly see the little group he’d been watching any more, they had become so small. And it didn’t matter anyway, for what were they to him, after all? Nothing at all to Private Lazarus Harris, of the London Volunteer Rifles, on his way to war and already heartily sick of it.

  28

  It started with a dream, or so Poppy thought. She was walking in a big wood with lots of very tall trees, just like the pictures in her The Wonders of God’s Beautiful World book except that she knew the wood was a real one, because a train was going through the middle of it, and at first it was nice there. The sun was warm on her back and the ground felt soft under her feet and the train bounced her along cheerfully; which was odd because she was walking on the ground and wasn’t on the train at all – but then it stopped being so nice. The ground got so soft she couldn’t walk on it fast enough and she had to drag her feet out of the softness and pull herself along by holding on to the trees and then it got hotter and hotter as the sun beat down on her back. Only it couldn’t be the sun because it was getting dark and the trees were getting very tall and threatening and leaning down and talking to her and telling her to eat up her chocolate and be sick at once – and she opened her mouth to shout at them to stop it, and felt the hot water pour in over her and woke up.

  It was dreadful. She couldn’t remember ever having felt so hot or hurting so much. Her hair was wet, the hotness was so bad, and she had been sick again. Not a lot, beca
use she had eaten nothing when they had got home but been put straight to bed, which had been exactly where she wanted to be, but now she didn’t want to be there. Bed was hot and sticky and nasty from being sick and her head hurt dreadfully – quite dreadfully –

  She got out of bed and pulled off the spoiled sheet and then wanted to be in bed again, and crawled back, but now the blankets tickled and tormented her and she had to get out again, and pull off her bottom sheet so that she could lie beneath it and stop the tickling; and then the mattress felt hard and scratched her and all she could do was cry, and that made her head hurt more than ever, as her nose filled up and her eyes began to smart.

  She did fall asleep sometimes, in between pulling so on her sheets and blankets, but only for a little while, for each time she slept the dreams came again and they were dreadful and frightening as all the pictures in her books began to wake up and move about and shout at her, and every time she tried to shout back and that made her head hurt more and woke her up again; and then she had to pull at her bed again to try to make it comfortable and that made her cry, and it went on for ever and ever, amen, just like in the prayers she said. For ever and ever and ever and ever –

  She must have shouted aloud in her dream because suddenly there was Mama beside her, her face long and white and her voice very loud.

  ‘What is it, Poppy? Now, hush, do, and tell me, what is it? Do you hurt? Where do you hurt? Show Mama –’

  But all she could do was shout some more and Mama’s face went away and that made her cry more loudly. Until Mama came back, and that was better for she had a wet cloth and a bowl and she put the wet cloth on Poppy’s hot face and that was wonderful, quite wonderful. She slept again then, and the dream got better. The darkness had gone from the trees and they had stopped leaning over her, and then they went away and all that was left was brown men marching, and marching – and she and Mama and Auntie Jessie ran ahead of the soldiers and turned round to look in their faces and then Poppy had to scream again for they had no faces, no faces at all.