by Anne Bennett
‘Aye,’ Bridie said. ‘Daddy did and that’s the point, isn’t it?’
‘What is?’
‘Mammy said nothing. God, Aunt Ellen, she loathes me still,’ Bridie cried. ‘She was barely polite. I wouldn’t ask her to look after the children at all if I were not desperate, but their safety is more important than my pride. I’ll get down on my knees to Mammy if I have to.’
‘I see that, girl, but surely to God she wouldn’t refuse to have them?’
‘She might well,’ Bridie said. ‘You didn’t see how she was with me. I couldn’t just foist them on her. It would be another black mark against me that she could make the children suffer for later.’
‘She wouldn’t do that, not to weans.’
‘To mine she could,’ Bridie assured her aunt. ‘She didn’t even glance at the photographs I took. She asked nothing about them at all and if Daddy did, she got up and began making tea, or clattering crockery, making it quite clear she wasn’t interested really in anything I had to say.’
‘But it would be different now, I mean the war hadn’t begun then,’ Ellen said. ‘It was just a rumour, good rumour, but now with the bombs and all …’
‘That’s what I’m banking on,’ Bridie said. ‘I’ll tell her how bad it is. I’ll make her see.’
‘And what if there is a heavy raid while you’re away?’ Ellen asked. ‘Have you thought of that?’
‘Of course I have,’ Bridie said. ‘It’s the one thing that terrifies me. I know you and Mary will see to the children and keep them as safe as you’re able to, but God, I will worry all the time I’m away. I can’t think of doing anything else though. At least, this way, in a few days time, they’ll be completely out of it – I’ll not leave until I have Mammy’s agreement.
‘I could write, I’ve thought of that,’ Bridie went on. ‘But a letter would take too long and she’d probably not answer anyway. I mean after the funeral, though she was so bad with me, Mary said maybe I’d broken the ice and to try writing to Mammy again. I did, you know how many times, and you know too that she didn’t put pen to paper to reply, not even the once, and if you mentioned me in your letters she never commented on anything you said.
‘She acts as though I don’t exist and because of me that my children don’t exist either. How then can I just arrive with them beside me?’
‘No, you’re right – the only way is to actually go and plead with her. I can understand how you feel, Bridie,’ Ellen said. ‘That sister of mine has put you through it over the years.’
‘It isn’t totally her fault,’ Bridie said. ‘She doesn’t know the full story.’
‘Well, we’ll keep it that way,’ Ellen said. ‘Now let’s start on these clothes for you. We can’t have you go to home in these rags you have on.’
While Bridie had been out, Ellen had sorted through clothes of hers and Sam’s that could be altered to fit Bridie and Mary, or cut down to make things for the children, and the two sat and cut and pinned and sewed as the house began to rouse itself, as first the children, and then Mary, came downstairs.
Bridie began to yawn as the afternoon wore on and eventually Mary persuaded her to have a rest before tea.
However, Bridie had only just dropped off when she was woken again by the siren piercing the night. With a heavy groan she got up and dressed and grabbing up the quilts and blankets, she hauled them down the stairs after her. She looked in on Ellen, knowing she wouldn’t leave Sam. ‘D’you want anything?’
Sam smiled a wan smile and shook his head, while Ellen said, ‘All we want is to see you safe down in the cellar. Go on now. Stop wasting time.’
Bridie handed her sister the quilts to settle the children on and Mary said, ‘We’ll have to take our chance with the gas and stay here – the other shelters are too far away to get to.’
Bridie nodded and hoped that the children hadn’t got to take that risk for long.
After the previous night, everyone was nervous, but though the raid went on for some hours and some of the bombs fell remarkably close, close enough to make the children jump and cling to their mother, the raid lacked the intensity of the one before.
It strengthened Mary and Bridie’s resolve, though, that the children must be moved to a place of safety and as quickly as possible.
The next morning, Bridie bought a Birmingham Post as she passed the paper shop in Bristol Street on her way to the station. It was not surprising that so much damage had been done, Bridie thought, when she read in the paper that three-hundred and fifty bombers had attacked Birmingham on the 19th November, the first of them dropping flares and incendiaries to light up the targets. Nine major factories had been hit that night, and many smaller factories had been targeted too. It was a severe blow, for all the factories had been working for the war effort in one way or another.
The city centre had been gutted, few areas escaping some form of damage either from bombs, parachute mines or incendiaries, and many of the major department stores were no longer standing.
Bridie was used to craters, disruption and mounds of rubble, but the extent of the destruction of Birmingham shocked her. When this war is eventually over, she thought, what in God’s name will be left?
She was glad though that, despite the bombing and destruction at the station, trains were still in operation: people had been working hard all that day to repair tracks and clear blockages and most regular trains, including the boat train from London to Liverpool, were working as normal.
The train was already in and she climbed aboard and lay back against the train seat. She was more than just tired: every bone ached and her eyes smarted and felt as if they had grit in them. She dreaded the ferry trip on that cold and windswept day, certain she would be as sick as a dog.
She wasn’t disappointed and when she alighted from the rolling ferry, she felt light-headed with hunger and lack of sleep and her stomach ached from vomiting. She was thinner than ever and her face looked gaunt, as white as lint and lined with strain. Her two eyes were like pools of anxiety standing out, ringed with red and with black bags beneath them.
And this was the picture Sarah saw that evening as she looked up from the hearth and saw her daughter standing by the door. She took in other things: the ill-fitting coat and the lack of gloves, scarf and hat on such a raw day and, glory be to God, bare legs stuck into shoes that had seen much better days. Resentment and anger towards Bridie faded at that moment, for this was her child and in need, desperate need by the look of her. ‘Mammy,’ Bridie said plaintively, for she was near collapse, and Sarah ran across the room and enfolded her daughter with her own good arm, shocked at her thinness.
‘Dear God, what ails you?’ Sarah said, drawing Bridie towards the chair by the fire and automatically hanging the kettle on the hook above it.
‘Oh, Mammy,’ Bridie said again, and she put her head in her hands and wept. She wept for the fear and helplessness she’d felt and the worry and the strain of the last few days. Sarah didn’t urge her to stop, or ask her what the matter was. She had the feeling that Bridie needed to cry, hadn’t done enough of it, being brave in front of the children most likely, and that she had reached breaking point.
Bridie’s sobs were easing and she felt the strain seeping from her. When she raised her head, her cheeks were wet, tear trails running down them, and her eyes brighter than ever, but the heart-rendering sobs had stopped.
‘D’you want to tell me about it, Bridie?’ Sarah said, for though her anxiety was primarily for the state Bridie was in, she wondered what had induced it. Was something wrong with Ellen maybe, or Mary, or, God forbid, one of the children.
But before Bridie was able to answer, Jimmy bounced through the door. There was no other word for it, but bounced. He’d been checking the stock in the fields when a neighbour had hailed him and told him he’d seen a girl, the spit of their Bridie, alighting from the rail bus just a few minutes before. Jimmy had known the man was not codding him; no one would over such a matter. ‘Was she alone?’ he
had asked.
‘Aye, I saw none with her,’ the man had said. ‘And she only had the one bag.’
Dear God! Fear had run like ice in Jimmy’s veins, for though he longed to see Bridie, he wondered what had brought her alone, headlong from Birmingham. He had thanked the neighbour, called to the dogs and almost ran back to the cottage.
He stopped at the door and stared at Bridie in shock. She looked ill, very ill, and he was filled with terror so acute that he felt his heart banging against his ribs. He was across the floor and holding Bridie tight in seconds.
Bridie proceeded to tell her parents how it was in Birmingham. She didn’t just describe the raid on 19th November, but from when it had all started. Jimmy and Sarah sat and listened to a catalogue of events they could barely comprehend, for all they’d read the papers and listened to the news bulletins on the wireless Jimmy had insisted they buy at the beginning of the war. No report was any substitute for hearing it first-hand from their own daughter who’d been living through it. Neither Ellen or Mary could tell them anything in the few letters they wrote during the time; besides the censor would have cut such things out anyway.
But now Bridie spared them nothing, because she couldn’t. The words spilled from her lips once she’d begun. They were appalled by the number of deaths and those injured and then Bridie finally came to the last raid. She didn’t think she’d have the words to describe the horror of that night and their terror, but she needed few words – her face said it all. Her sensitive eyes spoke volumes, as did her tremulous lips and shivering body that rocked slightly backwards and forwards as she spoke.
And so Jimmy and Sarah knew it all. Wee Jay in hospital and Bridie and Mary without a home or possession in the world. ‘That’s the reason for these clothes,’ Bridie said, pulling at the coat she still wore. ‘This is Ellen’s – she altered it for me. Mine was nearly in rags, dust laden and stinking with smoke.’ She stretched out her legs. ‘Between us, Mary and myself, we didn’t have a decent pair of stockings to our name. Ellen offered us hers, but … Well, she needs them, she’s an old woman – I didn’t want her to take a chill. Uncle Sam relies on her now. He’s virtually bedridden and Aunt Ellen can’t afford to be sick.’
‘Oh, my darling child,’ Jimmy cried. ‘What can we do to ease this for you?’
But it was to Sarah that Bridie spoke as she said pleadingly, ‘Will you take the children? Will you look after them until the bombings eased? Mary’s as well as mine? And will you love them as if they were your own?’
Sarah was ashamed that she’d not offered a place of sanctuary earlier, at least for the children. Whatever Bridie had done was hardly their fault and so, though her eyes shone with tears, she answered, firmly enough, ‘We will, Bridie,’ she said. ‘And we’ll be glad to do it.’
Bridie sighed in relief and looked from one to the other with gratitude, certain many of her troubles were over.
Bride slept like a log that night; she was tired out anyway, but she slept well because there had been no raids in Birmingham the previous night, at least there hadn’t been one up until the time Bridie went to bed, according to the reports on the wireless.
She was woken by the sound of the garrulous Beattie talking to her mother and remembered it was Friday, one of the days that Beattie and her husband came to help out in the farm and in the house. She looked at her watch and was horrified to see that it was ten o’clock. She’d never slept so late in her life and she told herself she should have been up earlier, helping her mother but when, later, she opened the door sheepishly, Sarah beamed at her. ‘You look better already,’ she said. ‘God, Beattie you ought to have seen the cut of her last night. Hadn’t slept in nights with the bombing and all.’
‘And your Mammy tells me you and your sister were bombed out.’
‘Aye, the whole area was flattened,’ Bridie said, and gave a shudder at the memory of it. ‘I thought we were all going to die. Mammy is going to see to the children while things are so bad.’
‘Aye, it’s no place for children,’ Beattie said. ‘And aren’t they better with their own flesh and blood when all’s said and done? Jesus, haven’t your parents this fine farm and all for them and isn’t it a grand place for weans to grow up? Won’t they be delighted so at the space and freedom and fresh air after the city streets?
‘My man was over there before we married,’ she went on, ‘and he said the air in the city would nearly choke the life out of you. And that was before any war. You’re doing the right thing, bringing the weans to your mammy. I mind when I was …’
The woman continued to talk as Sarah drew her daughter to the table and put a steaming bowl of porridge before her, with a jug of cream to one side and a dish of sugar to the other. Beattie continued to talk, but Bridie found she had to contribute little, but nod and make the occasional grunt, for Beattie liked the sound of her own voice best. But, for all that, Bridie sensed she was kindly and Sarah got on with her, as well as she would with anyone who took control in her kitchen.
When there was a gap in Beattie’s monologue, Bridie asked where her father was.
‘He was away to town in the cart just as soon as he’d had a bite after milking,’ Sarah said. ‘I gave him a list of things to get as he was going in, but he really went to get the battery charged up for the wireless. You mind it was losing power last night?’
Bridie did and was glad that her father had thought of it. She really needed the wireless to find out what was happening, especially when she was away from everyone. ‘When d’you plan to leave?’ Sarah asked.
‘Tomorrow,’ Bridie said. ‘I want the weans gone from the place as soon as possible and I’ll return with them straightaway. One thing, Mammy – they haven’t many clothes to bring. Everything was destroyed, you see.’
‘I’ll see to it don’t worry.’
‘I’ll give you some money and Mary will too.’
‘You’ll do no such thing.’
‘I will, Mammy, I must,’ Bridie said. ‘You don’t know how you’ve relieved my mind in agreeing to take them in for a while. I don’t want you to be out of pocket. Everything will have to be replaced.’
‘If it eases your mind I’ll take a wee contribution,’ Sarah said. ‘But there’s no need of it. Let’s talk about it again when you return and the children are safe.’
Aye, that was the one important thing, Bridie thought. She wished she could be back with them now with a click of her fingers, for every minute away she worried.
That evening, with the meal over and Bridie packed and ready to be off first thing in the morning, she settled before the fire between her parents. As usual Jimmy turned the wireless on for the news. The news was of Irish issues initially, and Bridie took little notice, but then it switched to the raids in Derry. Derry was in the six counties belonging to England and as ships were stored and made in the docks there, they suffered much enemy damage.
Then the broadcaster switched to the news from Britain, concentrating primarily on the nightly raids over London and the damage incurred. But he then said words that made Bridie’s heart almost stop beating,
Reports are coming in of a large body of enemy planes attacking a Midlands town. Approximately two-hundred and fifty bombers are involved. All areas of the city are being targeted with incendiary flares, followed by ordinary bombs, parachute bombs and land mines.
The raid is continuing with great intensity. There is much damage reported and a great deal of casualties expected …
‘Oh God!’ The roof of Bridie’s mouth seemed suddenly very dry.
‘No saying it’s Birmingham, pet,’ Jimmy said, seeing the blood drain from Bridie’s face. ‘A Midlands town. You heard him. Could be anywhere.’
‘It’s what they always call Birmingham in any national paper or BBC broadcast,’ Bridie cried. ‘No one really knows why when they name other cities. Only the Birmingham papers called it Birmingham. He’s talking about where my sister, my aunt and uncle and all the children are. I wish now I’d brough
t them all with me.’
‘You weren’t to know.’
‘I’m not stupid, Mammy,’ Bridie snapped. ‘I ought to have guessed. God, I might have known Hitler would have something like this planned. He’s done this before, giving us a day or couple of days’ respite. It does no good. You lie awake for hours, waiting for the shriek of the siren and then you’re struggling into clothes, and away in the cold inky black night. ‘Only now, of course Bristol Street shelter is gone and so they’ll have to take their chance in Ellen’s cellar. We stopped using them because we heard of people gassed in their cellars when the pipes were fractured by bombs.’ She turned horrified eyes upon her parents. ‘What if that should happen to them? What if I go home and find they’ve been choked to death?’
‘Bridie, stop it!’ Sarah said. ‘This does you no good. You all survived before and you’ll do it again.’
‘Only just, Mammy,’ Bridie said plaintively. ‘That raid! God, it was the worst I’ve seen and many times that night I thought we’d die, all of us. I prepared for it, I held the children close, so close that if we were going to die, it would be together. Who’s holding my babies this night?’
‘Bridie, what are you thinking of?’ Sarah said. ‘Dear God, won’t Mary care for them as if they are her own and Ellen’s there too.’
‘Ellen doesn’t leave Sam now,’ Bridie said. ‘She’s stopped using the cellar and stays with him in the bedroom. And Mary, she has Jay in hospital. What if she were visiting him and the raids were so bad she couldn’t get back?’
‘Bridie, stop torturing yourself like this.’
‘Mammy, you’ve no idea.’
‘Maybe, I haven’t,’ Sarah said. ‘But I don’t believe in crossing bridges before I come to them.’
Really Sarah and Jimmy were as worried as their daughter and yet they felt powerless to help. But Sarah doubted if Bridie even heard what she said, for the hourly news reports brought her little ease as they stressed the raid continuing unabated in ‘the Midlands town’, and said there was much damage and many casualties.