Marie saw her mother’s lip tremble. Silent tears filled her eyes and spilled onto her cheeks. Perhaps she was beginning to realize what Marie had known deep down since her first visit to Bourne. They’d lost Pam. The air raid had been a bad one, but it wasn’t the only reason Pam had gone back to Bourne, or even the main one. As far as Marie was concerned, the main reason was that Pam had learned to look down on them, with their lives of constant penny-pinching and making do, and pianos that nobody bothered to get tuned. She had an altogether superior life with the Stewarts and was adapting herself to it as fast as she could, picking up their middle-class vowels and manners and even their expectations, and fast discarding her own. Marie had a feeling that Pam meant to fasten herself onto the Stewarts for the rest of her life if she could, and she didn’t mean to let her own family get in the way.
She sat down and put an arm round her mother’s shoulders. ‘Buck up, Mam. The war can’t last for ever.’
Her mother sniffed hard, and wiped the tears off her cheeks with the back of her hand. ‘Take no notice of me. I’m just being stupid. I want her out of the way of the raids. I wish our Alfie would go back as well. It’s just . . . I wonder if I’ll ever see her again.’ She gave a heavy sigh and patted Marie’s knee.
‘You will; don’t worry. I meant to go and see Matron this morning, to get leave of absence for a few days until our Pam started to shape up, but there were so many people so badly injured, I couldn’t do it. I’ve seen some terrible sights today. But there, Pamela’s hopped it back to Bourne, so now the die’s cast. I’ll have to put my notice in, and that’s all there is to it.’
‘Poor Marie, everything drops on you. But Pam’s frightened of the air raids, that’s all.’
Marie didn’t argue. Now that the decision she’d agonized over had been made for her, she jumped to her feet with a sudden surge of energy. ‘Well, we’re not going to sit here staring at each other with long faces, making each other miserable either. I’ve had enough of misery today, so I’ll make us a cup of tea and a sandwich and then I’ll go up to the Elsworths for our Alfie. I’ll ring the Stewarts in Bourne while I’m there, make sure she’s got back safe, although what I can do about it if she hasn’t, I don’t know. And when I get back, we’ll all listen to the wireless for a bit. We must be due a broadcast from Lord Haw-Haw soon. “Germany calling! Germany calling!” I could do with a good laugh, and he’s the best comedy show of the lot.’
While making the tea, Marie was struck by how rational her mother had suddenly become, not confused at all. Well, long may that last. She carried the meal into the front room, so that they could sit in the armchairs and listen to the programme in comfort. But she managed to eat only half a sandwich and to hear about five minutes of the programme before that second wind of energy was gone, and she fell into an exhausted sleep.
‘We were out as soon as the all clear sounded with the mobile canteen, dishing tea and snacks to the rescue parties,’ Mrs Elsworth said, when Marie went to collect Alfie later that evening. ‘I’ve only just got back, and after what I’ve seen today, I feel very, very lucky to have a home to come back to. Thousands haven’t, after last night. All those houses destroyed, and so many poor people still trapped, children terrified out of their wits – it’s been a nightmare beyond your worst nightmare. What am I saying? It still is a nightmare for a lot of families, and it will continue to be for months to come. And the city centre beggars description. Absolute havoc, but you must have seen it for yourself, Marie.’
‘Havoc’s an understatement,’ Marie nodded, ‘but let’s look on the bright side. We’re still alive, and the Nazis have done such a good job on us it’s hardly worth their effort to come back and bomb us again tonight. There’s nothing left to destroy. They might leave us alone for a bit after this.’
‘I hope you’re right, but I wouldn’t bank on it.’
‘Is Alfie still here?’
‘He’s upstairs with Danny. They’ve been asleep most of the day, I think. Danny put him in Charles’s bed when they got back from the ARP post.’
Marie laughed. ‘Charles will appreciate that, I’m sure.’
Mrs Elsworth cracked a rare smile. ‘He really wouldn’t mind, you know, but he won’t find out unless you tell him. Those boys get on famously. I think they’re going to be great friends, which is nice, if we’re going to be related.’
‘I’ve worried about Alfie all day, ever since he cycled off to do his bit. In my imagination I’ve had him bombed, falling into craters, fried by incendiaries, buried under rubble, everything you can think of.’
‘Instead of which he was safe in the ARP post with Danny all night, playing billiards, apparently. Their services as runners weren’t taken up. Brave boys, though, to volunteer.’
‘Not brave,’ Marie frowned, ‘foolhardy. They think it’s all a lark. They don’t see the dangers, or they think nothing can happen to them. The trouble with boys his age is they think they’re immortal.’
‘I know, and with some boys, the feeling lasts until they’re into their twenties.’
‘You’re talking about Charles. Have you heard from him?’
‘He’ll telephone this evening, if he can.’
‘Do you mind if I wait, and have a word with him? I was going to ask you if you’d mind me ringing Bourne again, as well. Pam went back there this morning.’
‘Your mother thinks Alfie’s a brave boy,’ Marie told Charles when he rang. ‘He went up to the ARP post and volunteered to do his bit as a runner last night.’
‘Well, did he?’
‘What?’
‘Do his bit! What did he actually do?’
‘No messages were necessary, Chas. The telephones were all right at our end.’
‘Well, what did he do then?’
A great one for probing into things, Charles, Marie thought, feeling as if she were being cross-examined. ‘Played billiards,’ she admitted.
‘And I suppose he missed school today.’
‘Well . . .’
‘Well, of course he’ll volunteer to play billiards all night! And since it got him off school all day, I’ve no doubt he’ll volunteer again. And that’s contrary to treaty, isn’t it? I thought you warned him he had to go to school, if he wanted to stay at home?’
‘Well, yes, but—’
‘But nothing, Marie! You let yourself be hoodwinked by that little horror. He runs rings round you.’
‘I don’t think you realize how bad last night’s raid was. There are hundreds dead and injured, umpteen people homeless, the town centre just about demolished. Hardly one stone standing on another.’
‘You’re exaggerating.’
‘I’m not! Ask your mother, if you don’t believe me.’
‘All right, you’re not,’ he said, sounding a little subdued. ‘Well, I’m glad you’re all right. But take my advice and keep Alfie with you tonight, and out of harm’s way. And tomorrow, make him go to school. You don’t want an illiterate on your hands. How’s your mother?’
‘All right.’
‘Pam looking after her properly?’
‘Pam’s gone back to Bourne.’
There was complete silence on the other end of the line.
‘I’ll have to give up work for a while, and look after her myself,’ Marie said.
‘Of course you will. Everything drops on you, as always.’
‘That’s exactly what Mam said.’
‘And she’s right. And that’s your salary gone, not that it amounted to much. Ask Mum to steer you round some of these assistance people, see if you can get any help from anywhere. I’ll chip in as much as I can and we’ll stick to our plan to get married on my next leave, so you can get the allowance. I’ll see about getting a special licence.’
‘Chas, you’re so romantic’
‘Ha! Don’t think I don’t detect the irony. I’m more the naked lust type than the romantic, as we both well know. If I had you here, I’d show you what I mean.’
Marie laughe
d. ‘Me Tarzan, you Jane?’
She could hear the smile in his voice. ‘Something along those lines. Not much more refined than that, anyway.’
‘I think I’d better say goodbye. Your mum’s here.’
‘Maybe you should, before the conversation gets completely out of hand.’
‘Yes, Pamela’s here, poor child. She was in tears when I met her in Lincoln.’
‘I see. You met her in Lincoln. I’m sorry you’ve had to go to all that trouble and expense, Mr Stewart. If you’ll let me know the cost of the petrol, I’ll send a postal order,’ Marie said, banking on his refusing her offer, considering her chronic lack of funds.
He did refuse. ‘Pamela said the air raid was nothing short of terrifying,’ he went on, ‘but we already knew that. My niece knows some of our pilots. They told her they could see Hull blazing from the coast of Denmark last night.’
For a fleeting second Marie wondered what our pilots were doing on the coast of Denmark. Going to bomb hapless Germans while they lay in their beds, presumably.
‘Of course,’ Mr Stewart conceded, ‘you were concerned about your mother, and your work at the hospital, but I must say, it’s a great pity no other solution could be found than to take Pamela back to such a terribly dangerous place as Hull.’
In spite of his magnanimity about the petrol money, the strong note of reproach in his voice got Marie’s back up. ‘You’re right,’ she said, ‘Hull is a terribly dangerous place at the moment. I walked through it twice today on my way to and from the hospital, and the damage is beyond belief. And they could see it blazing from Denmark, did you say?’
‘That’s right, yes; they could see it quite clearly. It’s terrible for the people who have to be there, but really, everybody else should be evacuated. It’s certainly no place for any child. They should all be sent into the country, and kept away until the end of the war.’
He’d taken her bait. Now to make him squirm. ‘Well, after last night’s raid, I have to agree with you, and now I’m quite frightened for Alfie. Would it be too much to ask, I mean, could you see your way to taking him for the duration, as well as Pamela? It’s so much better when brothers and sisters are kept together, don’t you think?’
The silence was so long Marie almost began to think Mr Stewart had collapsed and died at the other end. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said eventually, ‘but we haven’t really got the facilities for two children. My wife is used to a very ordered life; she couldn’t possibly cope with a boy, and a boy like Alfie would be too much of a handful for her. Even the school found him a handful, and perhaps Mrs Morton wasn’t entirely unjustified in . . .’
Marie held her breath at that, and counted to ten, while Mr Stewart went on with his criticism of Alfie and his feeble excuses for not having him. But Marie didn’t push her request so far that it might have spoiled Pamela’s little idyll with the Stewarts, despite her annoyance with both ‘Uncle’ Alec and Pam.
‘That’s an awful pity. It would have been nice for them to be together. But you’re right, and it’s very good of you to keep Pamela out of harm’s way. We do appreciate everything you’re doing,’ she added, although it nearly choked her.
They hadn’t the facilities for two children – in that palatial house? Marie didn’t believe it, or that Morag Stewart couldn’t have coped with Alfie, had she wanted to. The top and bottom of it was that decorative and devious young girls who could forget their own families and adapt themselves like chameleons to their more luxurious new homes deserved protection from German bombs, but straightforward boys who had the temerity to be loyal to their own people and stick up for themselves in the face of bullying hypocrites did not, as far as Mr Stewart was concerned.
Marie hung up. Mr Stewart had been quite safe from a one-boy marauding party, had he but known it. Wild horses couldn’t drag Alfie away from home again. She tried to imagine him doing his piano practice in the Stewarts’ plush drawing room in Bourne, and liking it. No, it was impossible. Much easier to picture him playing billiards with another evacuation-dodger in an ARP post in Hull.
That business over, her mind turned to the next task on her list and the one she had the least relish for: giving notice at the hospital. It had to be done, and the sooner the better. She glanced at the lovely ormolu clock on the Elsworths’ mantelpiece. Half-past eight. Far too late to go back and ask to see Matron today. It would have to keep until tomorrow.
‘Would you mind calling Alfie, Mrs Elsworth?’ she asked. ‘I’m dead tired. I just hope the Luftwaffe will leave Hull alone tonight.’
‘Amen,’ she said.
Alfie protested he wasn’t tired when they got home, not surprising since he’d been in bed all day at the Elsworths’. Their mother was easily persuaded to let him stay up and listen to the radio, more than happy to keep him with her, and Marie was cajoled into playing battleships with him. Dad and Pam were missing, but the evening was as near to old times as it was ever likely to be again. They pulled the curtains and went to bed an hour before the blackout started, and in spite of her apprehension about another raid, Marie felt strangely light of heart. Charles had telephoned, and she hadn’t had to beg or plead, or even ask him for a thing. He’d taken it for granted that he should ‘chip in as much as I can’ and offered his help freely, even to the point of marriage. And Mrs Elsworth wasn’t as bad as Marie had previously thought. She’d been out with the WVS doing what she could for people, and she actually liked Alfie, which was a great point in her favour. Better for knowing, was Marie’s verdict on Mrs Elsworth, and the future showed every sign of being good – if they could just live long enough to see it.
The sirens wailed their first warning at five minutes past midnight. Marie groaned and rolled out of bed, feeling half dead. Alfie was up and dressed before she was fully conscious.
‘Where do you think you’re going?’
‘To the ARP post.’
‘Not tonight, my lad. You’re staying here with us.’
‘I’m not,’ Alfie said, and before she could get hold of him he ran downstairs, unlocked the kitchen door, and was out and off on his bike.
‘Where’s our Alfie?’ her mother demanded, after Marie had helped her to get up and dressed, and brought her downstairs.
‘Gone to the ARP post, again.’
Her mother’s face fell.
Marie put the kettle on to boil. ‘Don’t worry, he’ll be as safe there as he would be here, or in the shelter,’ she said, with more confidence than she felt. ‘He told you, all he did last night was play billiards with Danny Elsworth. If it’s the same again tonight, he’ll be just as safe there as anywhere else.’
‘And what if it’s not the same?’
‘Well, it can’t be any worse, can it? But if the phone lines come down, well, everybody knows he’s only eleven. Don’t worry, Mam, nobody’s going to send a kid so young with any messages. Look, I’ll go and get the chair cushions and put them in the cupboard so you can lie down if you want to; we might be here a while.’
Marie had just managed to fill the flask and get the usual bag of comforts ready when the second siren went. She stooped to get into the understairs cupboard beside her mother, prepared for another long night of terror with the air filled with the screaming and crashing of bombs.
‘Look on the bright side, Mam,’ she said. ‘We’ve a lot more leg room than last night. We can nearly lie straight,’ she said, struggling to keep the bitterness out of her voice at the thought of Pamela in bomb-free Bourne, safe and very comfortable in the Stewarts’ mansion. She knew which side her bread was buttered, that one. She certainly knew how to look after herself.
At five to six, after six hours of relentless bombardment, the all clear sounded. Marie opened the door to Alfie and Danny shortly afterwards and gave her brother an accusing stare. ‘Where the hell have you been? We’ve both been worried sick about you.’
Danny sprang to his defence. ‘He’s been with me; we’ve been running with messages for the rescue services. And if it
hadn’t been for me and Alfie, Constable Kilkenny would have been a gonner. He was blinded by a blast from a high explosive, and we had to lead him through some blazing incendiaries and then all the way to the first-aid post. I reckon he’d have burned to death if it hadn’t been for us, groping about like he was, wouldn’t he, Alfie?’
Alfie gave a modest half-smile. ‘We did all right, I suppose.’
‘Then we started roving the streets with a bin lid apiece, snuffing incendiaries out.’ Danny went on. ‘That was Alfie’s idea. Great fun, though. I bagged about nine.’
‘You mean you lidded them,’ Alfie said.
Marie went cold with horror at the thought of it. ‘Come in, both of you. Alfie shouldn’t have been roving the streets to drag anyone out of anywhere, or to lid anything. He’s only a bairn.’
‘I’m not. If you’re big enough, you’re old enough.’
She rewarded him for that with a clip round the ear. ‘Well, you’re not big enough, and you’re not old enough, either. Don’t you dare run off again when there’s a raid on, or I’ll have you, if the bombs don’t.’
‘Who’s there, Marie?’ Their mother’s cracked voice came from inside the house.
‘It’s Alfie with Danny Elsworth, Mam,’ Marie said, leading the boys into the dining room where Mam sat at the table. ‘They’ve been a pair of heroes, rescuing blind policemen from burning, apparently. Sit down, Danny. I was just making some tea for Mam. We’ll all have a cup, and you can tell us all about it, but speak up, so you don’t have to keep repeating yourself for Mam. And you make the most of it, Alfie, because you won’t be going again. Good luck to that policeman, and I’m glad you helped him, but there’ll be no more heroics for you, my lad. You’ll be staying where you’re safe, if I have to chain you to the floor.’
‘There’s nowhere safe in Hull,’ Danny shouted, for the doubtful benefit of Mrs Larsen. ‘All the rescue people we saw were saying the same.’
‘There isn’t a place of safety in the whole city,’ Alfie bellowed. ‘Nowhere.’
‘Thank God our Pam’s gone back to Bourne,’ Mrs Larsen croaked. ‘You’re going to have to go as well, Alfie; you’ll have to. I can’t rest with you here. You’ll have to be evacuated again.’
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