by Anna Smith
Chapter Nine
We had been catching minnows in jam jars and now we sat at the edge of the stream and watched the tiny fish dart about their murky prison. They buzzed round and round the jars, bumping into the side, confused but too stupid to know that they couldn’t get out.
‘Maybe it’s cruel to do that.’ Dan was lying on his stomach watching the minnows.
‘What? Fish don’t have a brain. They don’t know they’re trapped. That’s why they keep hitting the sides,’ Jamie said, chipping stones into the pool that had been created by the makeshift dam at the foot of the waterfall.
‘Well, brain or no brain, they look a bit upset. I’m putting mine back.’ Dan lifted his jar and headed towards the water.
He waded in and poured his jar over some pebbles that were barely submerged in water. The minnows struggled briefly, their bodies thrashing furiously, then they were carried away by the current. We watched as they disappeared like quicksilver into the stream.
‘There,’ said Dan, triumphantly, ‘they’re free now. They look happy.’
We all watched, and in the silence we could hear the water bubbling through the pebbles then rushing faster and more furiously as it flowed downstream.
Without another word, Jamie, Tony and me picked up our jars and poured them into the stream. It had taken us ages to catch them, and now here we were dumping them back in the water. We watched as they struggled, then swam swiftly to freedom.
‘Looks great, doesn’t it?’ Tony said, staring intently at the fish. ‘One day I’m gonna be like that. Like the fish. Just free to do what I want … run fast or walk slow … just keep goin’ and see what happens to me. I’m gonna be free.’ Tony’s eyes looked dark and sad.
‘What do you mean, free, Tony? It’s not like you’re in prison like the Bird Man of Alcatraz, for God’s sake,’ Jamie said, sitting down and opening the sandwiches he had brought for the picnic. We all followed him and took our sandwiches out.
Tony was eating, but he seemed far away. Then he spoke.
‘I’m gonna run away.’ It was as simple as that. He didn’t make a great elaborate statement, and he spoke softly. But we knew he meant it. We all looked at each other, afraid of what was going to happen next.
‘What, like … er, run away from home?’ Dan asked.
‘Yeah, away from home. From the Polack. From … from … er … Mom. I can’t take it any more. I’ve had enough and I’m gonna run away. I got plans. And … er … I got plans to get money too.’ Tony tossed away the crusts of his sandwich and they floated downstream. He guzzled a drink of diluted orange squash he had made up in a sauce bottle.
‘What about your mum, Tony?’ I asked, feeling panic rising in me that he was going to leave us. ‘I mean, your mum would die if you ran away. She’d be worried sick, Tony.’
Tony looked at me and then the others. He knew that we knew what had been happening in recent weeks, with the drink and his mum being found outside.
‘You know Mom. She’s … well, she’s … I just don’t want this any more. It’s bad. And I’m not stayin’ around. I hate it.’
‘Tony, you’re only eleven. I mean, where would you go? The cops would catch you before the day was out and bring you home.’ I was trying to think of ways to stop him, but I knew there would be no way.
‘That’s where you’re wrong, Kath. You see, I’ve got a plan. I’m goin’ to steal the money from the stash the Polack keeps below the floorboards, then I’m gonna hide out for a day or so … in the woods or somethin’, then I’ll get a train to somewhere. I dunno, maybe the coast or somethin’. Hell, maybe I’ll even go back to the States.’
Dan and Jamie were looking at each other, then at me, then at Tony. They knew he meant business and the only one who could stop him was me. But I knew that it wouldn’t work.
‘Why don’t you all come with me? We could all be together. I’ll get enough money … It’ll be all right. We can look after each other.’ Tony looked pleadingly at us. But he had a determination in his eyes. I had seen it before. Even if we wouldn’t go, he would go.
All of us sat pondering the possibilities of an amazing adventure. It was tempting. It would be like the movies. To run away and be free of everything. I could see that Jamie was turning the idea over in his head. He wouldn’t have to watch the brutality in his house any more, with his crazy dad getting drunk and hitting his mum. He was a big lad for his age and the thought of fending for himself, like some of the heroes we read about or watched on TV, appealed to him. Dan looked sad. He knew that no matter what, he could never leave his mum. Not while she still sobbed every night in her bed for his dad. Dan was the man of the house now, all the grown-ups kept saying, and he knew he would never be free. I thought of everything that was happening in my house. Of Ann Marie packing her bags to go to Donegal and give her baby away. Of Kevin with his secret that he was going to Australia. Of Mum and Dad and the same no-hope days. I would love to be free. Free to run and roam and sleep outside at night or in a barn or something. Free to go to the seaside and spend all your money in the café on fish and chips, then go to the pictures and stuff your face with sweets. And all the time, I would be with Tony. We would be together and we would look after each other. But then I thought of Mum and Dad and how everyone would be hunting high and low for me. They would cry their eyes out. No, I couldn’t run away. But my heart sank, because I knew that Tony could, and he would. And soon.
*
The way Barney told the stories, I was right there in the middle of the war. Right in the prison camp with the stifling heat and the stench of men dying in their own vomit and shit. I could smell the fear. I could see the cockroaches and the rats that ran over their feet at night. And sometimes a man would scream out in the blackness when he awoke to find a rat gnawing at his hands. During his vivid stories, I was rigid with fear as Barney sat on his chair, sucking his cigarette so deeply there were shadowy pockets in his cheeks, as he took me with him to the Jap prison camp. I watched his eyes narrow as he remembered with bitterness the beatings and the torture. Then they would go all misty when he spoke of the day it was all over and they became free men. But they would never be free, he said. On the day the troops threw open the gates, Barney said it was the sweetest moment. They all sang and cried and hugged each other’s emaciated bodies when the American and British soldiers rolled up to the camp in their jeeps and trucks. But Barney said by the time he was on his way to the US hospital, the horror of what he had been through felt even worse. And he never was a free man again.
‘I’m sorry, hen.’ Barney sniffed and brushed away a tear. ‘I didn’t mean to go all soft. It’s just that sometimes it all seems so painful.’ He put his hand on his chest. ‘I feel it right in here. Like a physical pain. I know you’re maybe too young to understand this, darlin’, but although the camp was like being in hell, it’s actually been harder being here all these years. You see, in the camp, you were all the same, struggling and fighting every day in the hopeless, stinking hole that it was. There was nothing to look forward to. But back home, here, I had to try to be like everybody else. Everybody thinks I should have been able to put it behind me, but I can’t … I can’t. It haunts my every waking hour.’ He stopped and put his head in his hands.
I sat quietly, scarcely breathing, not knowing what to say or do. His stories had been more and more dramatic every day I had visited him, but I had never seen such pain. I got out of my chair and went across to him and very hesitantly, gently, put my hand on his shoulder and squeezed it. Without lifting his head, he put one arm around my waist and pulled me close to him. He was holding me so tight with one arm I thought he was going to squeeze the life out of me. But I couldn’t say anything because I was afraid to hurt him even more. Then he looked up at me with his bloodshot eyes and his face all wet with tears. He stroked my hair and touched my face. His hands felt rough, but I felt so sorry for him. He held me like that for a moment, then I eased myself gently from his grasp.
‘I’l
l get you a cup of tea, Barney,’ I said, walking away from him into the kitchen. ‘Maybe you can show me some more of the medals and maybe even the gun you kept,’ I shouted from the kitchen.
As I poured the tea I thought about Barney holding on to me, and I thought about Father Flynn grabbing Dan. And then I remembered there were always stories at school of someone whose uncle or family friend had been interfering with the children and he had to move away from the village. But it didn’t feel like that with Barney. He just seemed sad and lonely and I think I was the favourite of all the kids who sometimes called in to him.
When I brought the tea and biscuits in he had pulled himself together and was limping across the room with the medals and some kind of object inside a yellow cloth. He spread the medals on the table. He explained to me what they were for. One for saving an injured soldier who he carried on his back for two miles behind enemy lines. One for leading his platoon to safety after crossing a raging river in the dead of night. Another, he said, was just for turning up for the war. Then he very deftly unwrapped the yellow duster. There it was. A real gun. A pistol, just like the ones on The Colditz Story. My eyes opened wide.
‘Can I touch it, Barney?’
‘Aye. It’s OK, there’s no bullets in it.’
I lifted the gun and examined it. It felt cold and heavy, much heavier than I would have believed. I put my hand on the trigger.
‘It’s amazing, Barney. Did you kill people with it?’
‘I did … I did, Kath. And they were just boys like me.’ He stroked the gun as though he was recalling each time he had fired it.
‘Where are the bullets, Barney?’
‘Oh, they’re kept separate. Never store the gun and the bullets together, for you never know when someone could come in and shoot you dead in your bed. I know where the bullets are, but nobody else does.’
He let me play with the gun as he puffed his fags and disappeared behind a cloud of smoke. I stood facing the mirror over the fireplace and held the gun in my hand, pleased with my reflection. I pointed it at the mirror. I looked just like one of the French Resistance or the British woman spy in the film Carve Her Name With Pride. I would have been great in the war.
Barney looked miles away. He was pouring himself another whisky, and I decided it was time for me to go.
I put the gun back on the table and he lit a cigarette, puffing it in hard and sniffing. He swallowed hard and I thought he was going to cry again.
‘OK, I’m away, Barney,’ I said, as I backed out of the room. I don’t know if he even saw me go, because he had seemed to slip into another world, the one he could never really escape from.
*
It had been raining for two solid days and I thought it would never stop. We were bored rigid, stuck in the house with nothing to do. I had gone to Tony’s house and Jamie and Dan joined us, sitting on the floor in the hall playing cards for matches.
We were playing poker and the stakes were high. Tony sat back and drummed his fingers on his chest, just like Maverick.
‘I’ll raise you five grand and I’ll call you.’ He stroked his chin.
‘I’m out,’ Dan said, surrendering his hand.
‘Me too,’ I said, spreading my pair of kings and an assortment of cards that didn’t match.
Jamie covered the bet, his face showing nothing. He turned over his cards. Three aces and two queens. He looked triumphant.
‘Not bad, boy … not bad,’ Tony said in his toughest American accent. Then he turned over eight, nine, ten, jack, queen, all hearts. ‘Tough shit,’ he said, pulling a pen he had been using as a cigar from the side of his mouth. ‘You got a lot to learn, boy. Better luck next time.’ We could never beat Tony at poker.
His mum came out of the kitchen with her raincoat on. Her face looked tired and drawn. She looked nothing like the woman I had seen knocking at the window the very first time I saw Tony in his garden. Now she looked sad and her eyes were a little bloodshot. She seemed jerky, and nervy, but as ever made us all welcome.
Tony looked a little embarrassed in case she was going to say anything or appeared to have been drinking.
‘Tony,’ she said, ‘I’ve put out some sandwiches and biscuits for you all, and there’s juice made up. I have to go to the shops and get some things in, so you boys all behave until I get back. OK?’
We all nodded sincerely, ready to get stuck into the food as soon as she was out of the door. She caught Tony’s gaze as she brushed past him and he looked pleadingly at her. He knew she was going to the shops to buy drink and that she would bring it back concealed in her bag before taking it to the bedroom.
‘OK, Mom. Er … how long will you be?’ Tony asked.
She told him about an hour and he looked satisfied.
As soon as she was outside, we were in the kitchen and at the food. As we tucked into the corned beef sandwiches, Tony told us he had a plan.
‘Do you guys want to see something interesting?’
I more or less knew what was coming. I knew he was going to take us upstairs and show us the Polack’s money that was stashed below the floorboards. I sensed we were in for another rollercoaster ride.
‘Yeah. Sure, Tony. What?’ Jamie said, stuffing his sandwiches into his mouth.
‘I’m gonna show you the Polack’s money box. I’ve never actually been right through it, but there’s lots of dough there. Fancy a look?’
We all glanced at each other. It was too good to miss.
‘What if he comes in and catches us?’ Dan was always cautious.
‘He won’t be home for three hours yet. Jeez, we could be in and out six times by then,’ Tony said, downing his juice and wiping his mouth with his sleeve. ‘C’mon, guys, let’s go.’
We followed behind him in single file along the hall and stood at the foot of the stairs. It looked dark up there. Jamie, Dan and I all looked at each other as Tony took the stairs two at a time. We hesitated.
‘What if he comes back early?’ I said, picturing the Polack walking in and finding us all with our hands in his money box.
Tony turned around and gave us that challenging look we had all seen before.
‘He won’t. He won’t come back. And anyhow, doesn’t that make it all the more exciting? C’mon, guys, what are you, scared?’
Jamie pushed past me and started up the steps.
‘Scared my ass,’ he said with a perfect American accent.
Dan and me followed, but not quite as fast.
In the bedroom the Polack’s big trousers were draped over a basket chair and the way they were hanging you could almost see the shape of him. The big black leather belt with a fat metal buckle was threaded through the loops and Tony caught me looking at it and knew what I was thinking. I guessed this was the belt he used to beat Tony.
He pulled back the rug from the side of the bed and carefully eased out the floorboard. Then he stuck his arm in all the way up to his shoulder and brought out the tin box. We all looked at each other in anticipation. He wiped the sweat from his top lip. He was nervous, even though he tried to act tough. He must have been terrified in case the Polack landed in on us, for Tony knew he would be history.
He reached under the drawer of the bedside cabinet and produced a tiny key. He held it up to us and raised his eyebrows and smiled broadly.
‘Watch this, guys,’ Tony said. He opened up the box and our eyes almost popped out of our heads as we saw the wads of money. There were fivers, tenners and twenty-pound notes. I had only ever seen about two twenty-pound notes in my life and I was thrilled.
‘Jesus, he’s a piggin’ millionaire,’ Jamie said, crouching down beside Tony, who was inside the box rummaging around.
‘How much is in there, Tony? Thousands?’ Dan said.
Tony lifted bundles out and began to count them. There were at least twenty bundles of what looked like hundred-pound wads, and there was more lying loose.
‘I’d say there’s about eight or ten thousand pounds here. Look,’ Tony said, rais
ing the box up to us. ‘Smell it. Real dosh. More than that asshole would ever need.’
‘God,’ I said. ‘He must be like a miser or something. I mean, he’s got all that money, but you said he hardly gives your mum anything. What does he do with it?’
‘He just keeps it. That’s what he’s like. Maybe he’s planning to leave some day and he needs cash. Well, let’s hope so. I’d be glad to see his Polack ass out the door and Ma and me would have some peace again.’
Tony kept rummaging and suddenly underneath the cash we saw what looked like a passport. But it was in a foreign language and it looked ancient. He pulled it out to examine it. He opened it up. We all gathered round. There was a faded black and white picture of a young man with a mass of curly dark hair and a stern expression on his face. There was no mistaking, though, it was the Polack. It was the first time I had ever seen his name. Tony had never even told us what his name was, he only referred to him as the Polak and so did we. Anton Zadrovic, it said below the photograph. We couldn’t make out what else was written, but we could read quite clearly the country. It didn’t say Poland. It said Lithuania. We all looked at each other.
‘I thought he was Polish,’ Jamie said.
‘So did I. We’ve always thought that,’ Tony said. ‘But this says he’s Lithuanian.’
We didn’t understand any of it and wondered why he had always said he was Polish.
Tony sifted through some more papers. Then he suddenly stopped. We all saw it at the same time. The swastika. It was familiar to us who had played the war games a million times. We had been to Colditz and back and we knew a Nazi when we saw one.
We could hardly believe our eyes. Tony pulled out what looked like an old newspaper.
On the front page was Hitler in an open jeep being driven through a street with masses of people lining the road. He was making the Nazi salute, as were the crowds. There was a swastika at each side of the top of the page. The paper was flimsy and yellowing. Tony opened it very carefully. There it was. The picture. Staring back at us. The Polack. The same face as the passport photo, but this time in the uniform of a Nazi SS soldier. He had a rifle over his shoulder as if he was guarding some Jewish prisoners. We couldn’t understand what the words said, but we could see they were telling a story about him. There was a picture on the same page of Jewish prisoners being transported to camps. We recognized the word Auschwitz.