When We Were Young & Brave

by Hazel Gaynor

  “That’s as may be, Nancy,” I remarked, “but it’s a small price to pay for the benefit of healthy bones when you’re older. You’ll thank me for it one day. It’s eggshells now, or arthritis later. Which would you rather have?” She swallowed the eggshells. “And, by the way,” I added with a wink, “your face will stay like that if the wind changes.”

  I took a spoonful myself later that day, to see how awful it really was, because I suspected the girls were making a terrific fuss over nothing.

  “What’s it like?” Minnie asked.

  “Absolutely dreadful.” I winced. “It’s like falling at the seaside and swallowing a mouthful of sand.”

  The grit stuck in my teeth all day. I delivered the girls’ next dose with a little more empathy.

  Thankfully, the children hated the powdered eggshells so much that it didn’t occur to them to ask where the eggs came from. Charlie had first told me about the black market operating in camp. He told me in strictest confidence as we’d walked back from breakfast.

  “It’s an extremely dangerous operation,” he explained, keeping his voice low. “Not only for the local farmers providing the eggs and other essentials, but also for everyone involved inside the camp.”

  “Are many people involved?” I asked, surprised by how accepting I was of the idea. If it helped us to obtain food and medicine, and other essential information and supplies, I was all for it.

  He nodded. “More than you might think.”

  “You wouldn’t happen to be involved? Would you?” I kept my voice low and walked close beside him so he could hear me.

  “Involved in what? I don’t know what you’re talking about.” He glanced at me, without any hint of irony or a smile.

  “Do be careful,” I urged. “I’d hate for . . .”

  “For what? Anything to happen to me?” Now there was a trace of a smile at his lips.

  “Just be careful, Charlie,” I said, before I hurried on to catch up with Minnie and Eleanor.

  But despite the secrecy surrounding it, rumors about the black market spread, the way so many rumors did as a result of living in such close proximity. The headmaster addressed the issue at the weekly staff meeting.

  “Desperate times call for desperate measures, and yes, there is a black market operating in camp through which we have been able to obtain some essential supplies, and information. It is being run through a priest. As a man without family commitments, he believes he is best placed to shoulder the burden of risk. He is aware of the likelihood of harsh reprisals should he, or the operation, be discovered. We are also operating what’s known as a ‘bamboo radio,’ a process by which secret coded messages are smuggled into camp. It’s a vital lifeline to the outside world, and one through which we hope to hear if the tide of war is turning in favor of the Allies.” It was a lot to take in, and there were a great many questions and plenty of conjecture and speculation. “I’d much rather none of you knew about it, if I’m perfectly honest,” he continued. “But some of you asked, and you have a right to know the truth.”

  For the dangers involved in getting them, and the health benefit they offered to the children, we treasured the eggshells more than the eggs inside. We stored them in an old tin box in our room, and couldn’t have kept a more watchful eye over it if it had been filled with precious diamonds and rubies.

  “Who would ever have thought it, Minnie. Watching over a box of empty eggshells as if we were warders at the Tower protecting the crown jewels.”

  But danger was never far from necessity, and sometimes the balance didn’t turn in our favor.

  I was walking back from breakfast with Charlie when one of the guards approached us.

  “Take off your shoes,” he shouted, as he grabbed Charlie’s arm and pulled him roughly aside, sending him stumbling to the ground.

  I ran to help him, but the guard blocked my path.

  “Stay back,” he ordered, waving his bamboo stick to indicate that I should leave. “Go!”

  Charlie looked up at me. His hand was cut and bleeding. “Go, Elspeth. I’ll handle this.”

  I couldn’t move. I stood, rooted to the spot, as I watched Charlie take off one shoe. He passed it to the guard, who ripped off the sole and shook the shoe roughly.

  “Other one,” he snapped as he tossed the first shoe to the ground.

  Charlie took a deep breath, and looked at me, and my heart sank. In an instant, I knew he was hiding something, and there was nothing either of us could do to stop the inevitable discovery and punishment.

  “Go, Elspeth,” he whispered. “Please.”

  Before he could say anything else, the guard raised his stick and struck Charlie’s ankles with a sickening crack.

  “Shoe! Now!”

  I couldn’t bear to stay; couldn’t bear to leave him. Head spinning, I turned and pushed my way through the small crowd that had gathered to see what all the commotion was about this time. Tears streaming down my cheeks, my hands over my ears, I stumbled blindly on, not sure where I was going, only certain that I couldn’t bear to watch them hurt him.

  Only when I reached the hospital did I stop and look back. In the distance, the crowd had started to disperse. As they did, I saw Charlie stagger to his bare feet, before he was pushed down again and dragged away, by his ankles.

  I wiped tears from my eyes and ran to tell the others, desperate to try and find someone who could help him.

  * * *

  Rumors circulated madly among the Chefoo group at mealtimes and roll call. It was believed that Charlie was being kept in solitary confinement, in a sparse stone building beside the commandant’s house. I couldn’t sleep; couldn’t bear to think of him out there, alone.

  “He’s strong,” Minnie offered by way of comfort. “He’ll take his punishment like a man. You’ll see. He’ll be back to us in no time.”

  But he wasn’t.

  Charlie’s absence made everything about Weihsien worse. The dirt was suddenly unbearable, the insanitary conditions unacceptable, the scraps of questionable meat and rotting vegetables inedible, the fear and threat of reprisal that swarmed over the compound as rampantly as the cockroaches was more unsettling than ever.

  “You’re fond of him, aren’t you,” Mrs. T said as we walked to church together.

  “I’m worried about him, as a friend,” I replied.

  “Of course. A friend you’ve grown fond of.” She placed her hand on my arm and pulled me to a stop. “It’s quite all right, you know, to form a friendship with a man, even here. In fact, it’s probably more important than ever. We need to grab onto anything that makes us feel human, Elspeth. Lord knows, they’ve stripped us of pretty much everything else. If we deny ourselves love in a place like this, then what the devil is the point of it all?”

  I stared at my feet. “You’re right,” I conceded. “I didn’t realize quite how fond of him I’d grown until this happened.”

  She raised an eyebrow. “We never do, dear. We assume people will be around forever, that we have all the time in the world to tell them we love them, or can’t stand the sight of them, and then . . . poof! They disappear, and it’s too bloody late to say anything at all.”

  She pulled a grubby handkerchief from her sleeve and dabbed at a tear against her cheek. She was always so forthright and strong, her tears caught me by surprise.

  “Oh, Mrs. T. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to upset you.”

  She waved my apology away as we walked on. “You haven’t upset me. I’ve upset me, silly stubborn thing that I am. It’s too late for me, Elspeth. Don’t leave it too late for you.”

  During the church service I thought about what she’d said. I thought about Harry, and about Alfie and Charlie, and all the missed opportunities and lost words.

  No more.

  From now on, I would tell the truth. Just as soon as he came back, I would tell Charlie Harris that I was terribly fond of him.

  Just as soon as he came back.

  Chapter 28

  Nancy<
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  Edward came to find me after Sunday prayers. I knew something was afoot as soon as I saw him running toward me, a grin on his face.

  “What on earth’s got into you?” I asked as he grabbed my arm and pulled me after him. I’d given up hope of being liberated, so I didn’t even ask.

  “You’ll never guess who’s here, Nancy. Never!”

  “Princess Elizabeth? The king?”

  “Don’t be silly. Eric Liddell! The Olympian! The Flying Scotsman! My hero! He’s actually here!”

  I couldn’t remember ever seeing Edward so excited. “He’s here in the camp? Is he visiting?”

  “Visiting? Why on earth would anybody be visiting this place? He’s a prisoner, same as us. Come on. I’ll introduce you.”

  I could hardly believe it until I met the man myself.

  “This is my sister, Nancy,” Edward announced when we found Mr. Liddell at the sports field. “Nancy, this is Mr. Eric Liddell.”

  He shook my hand. “Very pleased to meet you, Nancy.”

  I gawped at him, unable to find anything to say in reply. He wasn’t at all what I’d expected an Olympian to look like. He was completely bald for a start, and dressed in faded khaki shorts and a rather unusual patterned shirt which, he proudly announced when he noticed me staring at it, he’d made himself, from an old curtain.

  “I’ve been working as a missionary in China for so many years I’ve quite forgotten how eccentric I must look in my homemade clothes!” He laughed and did a twirl.

  Edward couldn’t wipe the grin from his face, but I felt shy in Mr. Liddell’s company. It wasn’t every day you met a real-life Olympian. I wasn’t sure whether I should curtsey.

  “Are you a keen runner, too, like your brother?” he asked. “Another budding Olympian?”

  I shook my head. “I want to be a scientist, or an astronomer.”

  He smiled, and looked impressed. “Very admirable. Then I’ll look forward to having you in my science class, Nancy.”

  “You teach science?” I couldn’t hide my delight.

  “I do now. We all have to do our bit to help out.”

  Since our teachers had to take their turn with camp chores, several camp inmates who had experience in a particular subject had joined the Chefoo School teaching staff. They had a rather unconventional, un-Chefoo way of teaching, which we all rather enjoyed. To think that an actual Olympian would be teaching me was beyond thrilling.

  Word about Mr. Liddell’s arrival spread quickly around camp, and a small crowd of children soon gathered, eager to see him for themselves.

  “Well, isn’t this something.” He smiled. “I’m delighted to discover such a lot of children in need of regular physical education. We shall keep each other very busy, no doubt.”

  I was so pleased for Edward. Mr. Liddell’s unexpected arrival had given him a reason to smile again. I’d been worried about him recently because he’d grown at least another inch and had also grown dreadfully thin. I tried to give him my portion of food sometimes, but he refused to take it.

  “You need your strength, too, Nonny. Besides,” he added, lowering his voice and tapping the side of his nose, “the black market will see me right.”

  I didn’t like Edward getting mixed up in such things, but I knew there was no point nagging him. He’d told me how the black market worked by people trading things they didn’t want for things they did.

  “A group of Chinese farmers who live outside the camp are in secret contact with people inside the camp,” Edward explained. “They smuggle things in with the men and women who come to empty the latrines. According to the American man we share a house with, you can get whatever you want: cigarettes, tobacco, chocolate. One woman traded her wedding ring for some sugar and soap.”

  “Is that what happened to Master Harris?” I asked. We’d heard about him being searched by the guards and taken away somewhere.

  Edward nodded. “’Fraid so. Risky business.”

  Although I didn’t see him very often, since the boys’ accommodation block wasn’t close to ours, I was glad to have Edward around. Whenever I did see him, he was usually with Larry and the older boys, and I was too shy to go over. Edward waved if he saw me, and Larry always smiled, but I couldn’t be sure if he was teasing me, or really smiling, so I never smiled back, just in case.

  * * *

  Uncle Eric (as Mr. Liddell soon became known by the camp children) quickly became an important addition to the compound. He told us he’d been captured in central China with a group of other missionaries, and brought straight to Weihsien. He hadn’t, unfortunately, come across a Lillian or Anthony Plummer during his work. I’d secretly hoped he might know them, and might have brought a message from my mother to say she couldn’t wait to be reunited with me. But he had no such message to give me.

  “Try not to be too disappointed, Plum,” Mouse offered when I told her he didn’t know my parents after all. “China is enormous; it would have been rather miraculous if he had known them.”

  Still, Uncle Eric brought plenty of other things to camp. He was a very kind and gentle man, always looking for ways to help out, even if it wasn’t part of his assigned duties. He organized games of hockey, football, and softball, and made up exciting PE competitions to keep us all fit and healthy. Mouse called him the Bald Piper because he never went anywhere without a group of children running alongside him. He was quite the celebrity, and we all adored him.

  “If I train really hard, I might even be good enough to make the Olympic team when we get out of here,” Edward said, brimming with enthusiasm. “Imagine it, Nonny! When they ask who coached me, they’ll never believe it!”

  I said that would be marvelous, because I didn’t like to point out that, with his arms and legs having got so skinny, he’d do well to run to the latrines, never mind around an Olympic track. Still, it was nice to see Edward back to something like his old self, showing off with all the things he knew about Uncle Eric and the Olympics, and full of enthusiasm again.

  If Edward and Larry couldn’t believe their luck about having an Olympian as their PE teacher, I couldn’t believe my luck about having such a fascinating science teacher. Uncle Eric knew much more than the Chefoo teachers. Best of all, unlike our own teachers, who didn’t like us to ask too many questions and stuck strictly to the school syllabus, Uncle Eric encouraged us to question and wonder.

  “It’s the best way to learn, and the only way to really become a scientist,” he said, in his lovely Scottish accent that sounded like a song. “We might never discover the answers, but the quest for knowledge drives discovery and invention. Always ask. You never know where your question might lead.”

  Mouse shared my interest in science and the stars, and was as enthralled by Uncle Eric as I was. We talked about his lessons for ages after, and wondered about things together, in private. I’d started to realize I had an awful lot in common with Mouse and, with poor Sprout still confined to the hospital, I’d come to depend on her. We navigated our strange new life together, explorers mapping uncharted waters. But one thing that made us both feel rather lost and disoriented was the way our bodies changed as we grew up, or how they didn’t change, in my case. I still hadn’t started my monthlies. Mouse said I must be a late developer.

  We decided to take Uncle Eric’s advice about asking questions, and plucked up the courage to ask Connie about boys and sex and things. We couldn’t bear to ask Mrs. Trevellyan, even though she’d offered. Apart from anything else, we decided she was much too old to remember anything about it.

  “Why do you want to know?” Connie asked. “You’re still too young to be bothered about boys.” She wasn’t the least bit embarrassed, even though Mouse and I squirmed.

  “We just thought we should know,” I explained. “We’ve seen the women with their big swollen bellies, and we know it isn’t true that you get a baby from kissing, or from touching someone’s belly button. Uncle Eric says scientists should always ask a question, rather than guess. So, we’re a
sking you, because you’re the oldest girl we know.”

  Connie told us to sit down and to prepare to be shocked. Both of us were too horrified to ask any questions at all.

  There was rather a lot for Mouse and I to talk about afterward.

  “I’m never having children,” she said.

  “Me neither,” I agreed. “I think I’ll just have lots of cats instead.”

  Having just had “the conversation” with Connie, we both looked at the pregnant ladies in camp rather differently, but one woman in particular caught my eye as we made our way back to the accommodation block.

  I tugged at Mouse’s sleeve as the so-called honeypot girls walked past us on the way out of the compound. Large buckets of waste swayed from the bamboo poles they carried over their shoulders. We both covered our noses to block out the awful smell.

  “Look, Mouse. Isn’t that . . .”

  “Shu Lan,” she whispered. “Yes, it is!”

  Without hesitating, we ran over to her.

  “Shu Lan! It’s us! Nancy and Joan! From Chefoo!”

  She glanced over her shoulder toward the guards, and took a few steps toward us. She looked dreadfully tired. Her belly was swollen, like some of the women we saw around the compound.

  I smiled at her, surprised by how pleased I was to see her, to see part of our past from Chefoo School. I thought about our last day before the soldiers arrived, when we’d made paper snowflakes and Shu Lan had told us about the kingfishers trapped in the metalsmiths’ nets. I’d thought about the story so often since. It was why I’d chosen Kingfisher for the new Guide patrol name.

  “Hello,” I said, full of enthusiasm. “It’s ever so nice to see you.”

  But Shu Lan didn’t seem as pleased to see us. She looked nervous as she pulled a tiny piece of folded paper from beneath her hair. “For Miss Elspeth.” She kept her voice low and glanced anxiously behind me as she held her hand at her side. “Please. Take it.”

  I stared at her hand and thought about how Master Harris had been taken away for apparently smuggling notes inside his shoe. I wanted to help, but I didn’t know if I should. I wished Edward was there. He would know what to do.