by West Camel
‘I was filthy, covered in the mud from the tunnel and the dust and smoke from the fire in the Methodist Mission. My scalp was sore too, and without touching my head I knew I had lost a lot of my hair. I think I sighed a bit; and I think I felt thirsty, but I couldn’t bring myself to scream or fall to my knees, like I’d seen other women do when they came out of the shelters to find their whole lives flattened. I suppose I was one of those that kept quiet and tried to see what could be done. And I think I might have already had an idea that things had changed for me.
‘Someone barged past me on the pavement, even though there was plenty of room for them. I didn’t even murmur or look to see who it was, but it jolted me out of my trance, and I climbed up onto the pile of bricks.
‘Was he under there? The draper and his wife? The two of them, stuck in the cellar together, waiting to be dug out. Or were they crushed by the shop falling on top of them? It all felt like it was happening up on a screen at the cinema, or it was a story about somewhere far off being read out of a newspaper to me. My face itched and I could have done with something to eat and drink; those were the strongest feelings I had.
‘I threw a few bricks and sticks of wood about, although I wasn’t sure what I was looking for. The street got busier and people stopped to look at the destroyed shop. Some of them were my customers, but no one called out or even pointed. I wasn’t surprised or puzzled. Everything had changed.
‘There was cloth among the bricks and wood, of course, it being a draper’s. While I sat on the pile a few women had a poke about, seeing what they could get hold of. The wardens chased a couple of them off, but they ignored me. There wasn’t that much left, though; the draper had struggled for months to get new stock in. I picked up a couple of lengths too, and one long piece of white linen. I had no idea then what I’d do with it; perhaps I took it because it came out from under the bricks so easily, in a long, pale stream; it wasn’t even dirty. I put my face in it, and closed my eyes inside its clean, white smell.
‘I slept like that, sitting on the bricks, my head buried in the long sheet. It must have been for hours, because when I woke up it was certainly afternoon; I could smell dinners being cooked somewhere. I scrambled off the bricks with the sheet wound around me, and still holding on to my bag full of muddy cloth from the tunnel, I crossed the road to the pie shop. There were a few old men slowly working through sloppy pies that looked more vegetable than meat. The girl behind the counter was cutting bread into very thin slices.
‘No one even acknowledged me, although I must’ve looked a fright.
‘I walked to the counter, took a glass and filled it with water from the metal jug. It stung my throat, but I downed the whole glass in one go. Now then; did I dare? I had no money in my purse – Mrs French hadn’t paid me, and what I had was in a strong box somewhere among the rubble of the draper’s shop, along with my bank book and my coupons. I waited until the girl’s back was turned, then put my hand out and took a slice of bread from the pile on the counter. The girl turned back and paused for a moment, looking at the pile. Then she shook her head and continued with her cutting. I took three more slices and another glass of water and walked out of the shop.
‘I ate my meal sitting on the remains of my home. The bread was chewy and the water just made it into hard balls. When I swallowed them, I realised my throat was raw.
‘So this was how it was to be. I searched myself for some surprise, like when I searched for a dropped needle in the folds of a shirt, but I couldn’t find any.
‘Up above me, I heard a tinny rattling. The sound was familiar, but I couldn’t place it at first, sitting on the rubble, chewing stolen bread. A gust of wind picked up a handful of dust and flung it in my face so that the bread became gritty. I took a gulp of water and looked up to where the noise came from.
‘The wall of the building next door was still standing, and in it, three floors up, I could see my bedroom fireplace was still attached. On the mantelpiece, half off the shelf, in fact, was my tin. When the wind blew strong enough it rocked. It was an old tin, bent out of shape from all the travels it had made with me. I stood up sharply and the rubble gave way, so that I staggered, but I didn’t fall. There were just a few things in that tin, but the one I knew I wanted was the strip of cloth with the motif stitched onto it. The original one the woman had given me.
‘From the moment I realised I hadn’t died in the bombing, the motif was in my mind. But I wasn’t really thinking about it; it was more like it was thinking about me. So of course, I was not surprised in the slightest that it hadn’t been buried in the rubble: it had escaped – just like me. It was up there, in the tin on the mantelpiece. For a second, I thought it was a little animal, writhing around, making the tin rock.
‘I picked up a piece of broken brick, aimed and threw it up towards the fireplace. I missed by a mile, so I tried again, standing back to get a better shot, but it was too high. I was determined, though; I threw more bricks, bits of plaster and tile and lumps of wood, as if my life depended on getting the tin down. My shoulder started to hurt after a while, but with my burned scalp and throat, and itching all over, it didn’t seem like anything to worry about. I just kept on slinging stuff, in a kind of daze, not really aiming in the end. I didn’t even see if I hit the tin or not, but at last it was dropping through the air, incredibly slowly it seemed. It landed a few feet from me and sprung open. My little set of documents – my bills and forms and certificates – all blew away. And only one strip of cloth was left.
‘It was like a little snake, curled around on itself, pretending to sleep.
‘I snapped the tin shut and stuffed it in my bag with the muddy tapestries. I wound the sheet tighter around me, so it wouldn’t trip me up and hurried away from the bomb site, as if I’d been scared off. I think I bashed into people on the street, but no one stopped me or said a word. No wonder, really – I caught sight of myself in the window of the Co-op: a bundle of dirty rags with hair standing up and a grubby face.
‘The only place I could think to go was to Jack and Digby’s. Apart from the draper, they were my only real friends. They were caulkers, and lived together in a house attached to a boatyard on Creekside. Everyone knew they were lovers, but no one mentioned it; they just called them the Caulkers, and then went on to something else. Jack and Digby escaped attention that way, I suppose, and it suited them. But I looked out for them, and they looked out for me in their way. They were the only ones who kissed me on Old Year’s Night. Their fingers always smelled of oakum.
‘But when I turned the bend under the railway, I saw that the gate to the yard was lying on the cobbles. A few more steps and I saw that half the sheds inside had collapsed and there was just a mess of wood between them. Of course, I thought. After the bomb in the Mission, and with the draper’s shop gone, it was no surprise that Jack and Digby would be gone too. I turned around and took the alley beside the railway – down to the creek and the front of their house. The tin made a noise in my bag; I’d have sworn the motif was writhing around, knocking on the lid, trying to get out.
‘I stood on the ledge in front of their door. From this side, the house looked intact – not even a window was broken. I knocked, not really expecting an answer, and walked in.
‘Everything was covered in a layer of brick dust; it had put the fire out in the stove. They always kept a fire going, even in the summer, using bits of oakum and cotton as well as wood and coal. The smell of the pine tar used to fill the whole place and it was always too hot. But now it was cool and smelled of fire and brick. I put my bag down on the table and went to the door under the stairs that led to the bedroom.
‘The door wouldn’t open; it was stuck in its frame. I had to push and pull and twist to get in. There was daylight on the other side. Most of the roof had fallen in and beams criss-crossed the room.
‘Jack and Digby’s bed was opposite the door; I could see the end of it, and the long shapes of legs and feet under the blanket; the rest was covered with wo
od, plaster and tiles.
‘I spoke to them as I worked to get them out. “You two,” I said. “Why didn’t you go to the shelter like everyone else? I’ve told you enough times. It’s not safe here. You act like you’re living in the middle of nowhere, you silly boys.”
‘It wasn’t like when I was searching for the baby in the Mission; my heart didn’t beat fast and I had no tears. This was a quiet job for friends. And for all my telling them off, I was well aware they knew what they were doing. And I had the proof when, after I don’t know how long, I got the last pieces of brick and wood off them. There they were, clinging together, legs and arms wrapped around each other, faces pressed close. I stood back and stared at them, and then I had my little cry; no sobs, just warm, good tears that cleaned up the dirt on my face a bit. They’d chosen to die like this, together. And telling myself as much was a comfort just then.
‘They were cold and taut under my hands. “You knew I’d find you, didn’t you, boys?” I said to them. I couldn’t know if this were true; but I still like to think it was.
‘They were locked together so tightly, it took a while to get them out of the bed and onto the floor. Then I had to clear a path to the door. I dragged them by their ankles; I looked away from their faces, but I could still hear their heads knocking against things. They’d have laughed at that, I know they would.
‘I laid them out on the flags beside the sink and tried to clean them up as best I could. But they were hugging so close, I couldn’t get them apart. Thinking back, it was good that I couldn’t. They were better as they were.
‘I didn’t really decide to do any of this. Just like I hadn’t really decided to go back into the tunnel, to take the tapestries, or the sheet, or get the tin. Everyone used to talk of shock after being bombed; the blast knocking something out of your head. Perhaps there was some of that with me. But standing over Jack and Digby’s wet, dead bodies, not really being able to see whose leg was whose, or where one arm went under and the other over, all I could feel was that I should be dead. I should have gone with Jack and Digby, with Mrs French and her baby – with the draper. I should’ve crossed over, as Mrs Clyffe always called it when a baby died.
‘But something had kept me here. Something that was too strong – a stitch that hadn’t snapped. I was dead to all intents and purposes. I’d lost everything. There was nothing left of me that anyone would attend to – I’d seen that much in the High Street. But I wasn’t dead. I was still here.
‘My bag was on the table; I’d knocked it over getting Jack and Digby over to the sink. The muddy tapestries were spreading themselves across the table top, and in among them was the tin with the motif inside.
‘There was no one to bury Jack and Digby but me. Neither of them had any family – they’d said so many times – they just had each other. I went back into their bedroom and moved things, so I could get to the drawers where they kept their linen. I took a couple of sheets, went back in the kitchen and wrapped them up. Halfway through the job, I realised that the long piece I’d pulled out of the rubble of the draper’s was still around me.
‘“Not me,” I said. “Not yet.” And I took it off.
‘In the big upstairs room, Jack and Digby kept all sorts of stuff they used for their boat work: pots of pine tar; coils of rope and sail material; chains and cleats and pulleys; tarps and waterproofs and no end of other things. And the boat they took out on the river was tied up outside the front door. Everything was set out for me, I thought. I could’ve sat mourning my friends, or gone back to the draper’s and sat in the bombsite, or even back to number thirty-six and cried for Mrs Clyffe, dead for so many years. But there were things to do.
‘I fetched some rope and some chains for weight from upstairs, and wrapped them around the big white bundle. Then I dragged it out of the front door. It took a bit of effort, but I tumbled Jack and Digby down into the boat. Then I went back inside and fetched a piece of tarp and an old mackintosh cape. I wrapped the tin up in them and secured it with some cord.
‘But then I unwrapped it again. It was beginning to get dark in the kitchen, so I found the matches and lit the oil lamp. The motif was folded quietly in one corner of the tin. I poked at it, but there was no movement. Of course there wasn’t; it was just wool and hemp. I picked it up delicately and laid it in my palm. It was warm.
‘I saw her face; her rolling eyes, her twisted mouth gasping and gabbling things I didn’t understand back then, when I was just a child. I still didn’t understand it, but I would. The muddy water from the tapestries trickled across the table and dripped onto my lap.
‘I held the strip of cloth up to the light – I could see both sides, which made it all the more complicated and intricate. I knew it inside out, of course; all those nights in the orphanage, learning it, studying it, drawn deep into its layers and back-turns and cleverness.
‘I had put it away once I came home to Deptford; the original the woman had given me, and all my copies of it. I hadn’t forgotten it, though. It had always been there, hiding in my little tin. I had never tried, or thought of trying to undo it. Not when I’d got it wrong and had to start again. Not when I was running out of fabric or thread. I had always started afresh. Why was that? I asked, looking at it. I think my lips moved.
‘I pushed it back in the tin and slammed the lid shut, as if it would take the opportunity to scamper off and present itself to someone else – someone who had children and a husband and a mother and father to look after, and couldn’t be bound by its nasty spell. There was a nasty spell, I knew that now. I just had to discover what it was.
‘I wrapped the tin back up in the tarp and mackintosh, put out the lamp and went outside to the boat.
‘Jack had been teaching me to sail in the months before the war, but I’d never been out on the river alone. I made out he could hear me: “Right, now Jack, you’ll see, I can do this without a word from you.” I could hear his quiet chuckle, and the calm firm voice he used to tell me the order to do things in. I suppose I could have dropped him and Digby straight into the creek in front of their door. And Mr Mellor would have found them when he came to do his dig after the war. Perhaps that was why I took the boat out and put them somewhere they wouldn’t be disturbed.
‘The river was busy in those days, and it being blackout, the boat lights were shielded. But there was only a slight wind, which was a blessing. I slipped through the rows of barges, and tried to keep out of the way of other boats. No one saw me and I had no lights at all – so I had to forget all about the rules of the river. But I didn’t doubt that I’d be safe. I’d survived the bombing; I knew something was keeping me alive.
‘When I got to the Naval College at Greenwich, I came about. I was opposite a big pub; I could hear the sounds of people drinking and shouting inside; there were slithers of light in the windows where the blackout material wasn’t properly fixed. I didn’t even think to be secretive. What I was doing must seem suspicious, but who was looking?
‘It took a lot of effort to get the boys up onto the gunwale of the boat, and I nearly fell into the water several times. In the end, I had to lean back on the opposite side and push them with my feet. The long bundle see-sawed for a moment; I gave it a final kick, and it slowly slipped into the river, not making much of a splash. I could see the pale of the sheet for a couple of seconds, and then they were gone. I paid out the rope steadily as they sank, hoping the chains were heavy enough to take them to the bottom, and hoping the rope was long enough. It seemed to be a long time until I felt them hit the mud. Then no more rope passed through my hands. This was the end for them.
‘I opened my mouth to say something. I knew plenty of prayers. I’d spent my childhood repeating them. But nothing seemed to say what I wanted it to. I’d buried them; that was enough. And I had lots of rope to bind up the parcel of tarp and mackintosh with the tin inside. I sat on the middle thwart of the boat, the boom brushing over my head, and I looked at the squarish package in my lap. The boat drifted a little
and the rope attached to Jack and Digby tugged, trying to pull the parcel into the river.
‘I thought of unwrapping it all and taking the motif back with me. I could carry it around in my bag, couldn’t I? That would be safe. Then I spoke – who to, I’m not sure. Perhaps to my friends on the riverbed, perhaps to Mrs Clyffe, perhaps to the motif itself. But now I think I said it to that little girl who took the strip of cloth down in the tunnel all those years before:
‘“I could undo it.”
‘I had no idea what that would do. I would later, but not then. But as soon as the words were out of my mouth, I wanted to fling the tin into the water; to drown it. But I knew I had to be able to come back and find it.
‘I looked across at the pub – and on the north bank at the little domed entrance to the foot tunnel. I needed a buoy. I jammed the tin under the thwart and scrabbled around in the bottom of the boat looking for something that would float. There was a can of fresh water. I emptied it into the river, screwed the cap back on and tied the last bit of rope through the handle. This would do for now.
‘I slung the tin, the rope and the buoy from where I sat. It made a great splash, and kicked up some froth. The tin lay on its side and bobbed on the surface. The tide was rising, and the boat began to go with it upstream. I would come back some time – I wasn’t sure how soon. I would say hello to Jack and Digby, maybe look inside the tin.
‘Back in Jack and Digby’s kitchen, I sat with a mind that was absolutely blank. No thoughts would stay for more than a split second – they just dissolved. What was left was a grey and white mist.
‘The lamp ran out of oil in the early hours. The dark woke me; at least, it made me stand up – what is sleep when your mind has shut down? There was a thin blue light in the room – the moon reflecting off the creek. I went to the sink – the tap still worked then – and began to wash myself, slowly, steadily, my whole body.