The Penguin Book of First World War Stories (28 page)

One day early in May I was passing Mrs Roofe's when I saw that lady in her patch of garden, and stopped to ask after Betty.

‘Nearin' her time. I've written to Jim Beckett. Happen he'll get leave.'

‘I think that was a mistake, Mrs Roofe. I would have waited till it was over.'

‘Maybe you're right, sir; but Betty's that fidgety about him not knowin'. She's dreadful young, you know, t''ave a child. I didn't 'ave my first till I was twenty-one.'

‘Everything goes fast these days, Mrs Roofe.'

‘Not my washin'. I can't get the help, with Betty like this. It's a sad business this about the baby comin'. If he does get killed I suppose she'll get a pension, sir?'

Pension? Married in the wrong age, with the boy still under service age, if they came to look into it. I really didn't know.

‘Oh, surely, Mrs Roofe! But we won't think about his being killed. Jim's a fine boy.'

Mrs Roofe's worn face darkened.

‘He was a fool to join up before his time; plenty of chance after, seemingly; and then to marry my girl like this! Well, young folk
are
fools!'

I was sitting over my Pensions work one evening, a month later, for it had now fallen to me to keep things listed in the village, when someone knocked at my door, and who should be standing there but Jim Beckett!

‘Why! Jim! Got leave?'

‘Ah! I had to come and see her. I haven't been there yet; didn' dare. How is she, sir?'

Pale and dusty, as if from a hard journey, his uniform all muddy and unbrushed, and his reddish hair standing up anyhow – he looked wretched, poor boy!

‘She's all right, Jim. But it must be very near, from what her mother says.'

‘I haven't had any sleep for nights, thinking of her – such a kid, she is!'

‘Does she know you're coming?'

‘No, I haven't said nothing.'

‘Better be careful. I wouldn't risk a shock. Have you anywhere to sleep?'

‘No, sir.'

‘Well, you can stay here if you like. They won't have room for you there.' He seemed to back away from me.

‘Thank ye, sir. I wouldn' like to put you out.'

‘Not a bit, Jim; delighted to have you and hear your adventures.'

He shook his head. ‘I don't want to talk of them,' he said darkly. ‘Don't you think I could see 'er to-night, sir? I've come a long way for it, my God! I have!'

‘Well, try! But see her mother first.'

‘Yes, sir,' and he touched his forehead. His face, so young a face, already had that look in the eyes of men who stare death down.

He went away and I didn't see him again that night. They had managed, apparently, to screw him into their tiny cottage. He was only just in time, for two days later Betty had a boy-child. He came to me the same evening, after dark, very excited.

‘She's a wonder,' he said; ‘but if I'd known I'd never ha' done it, sir, I never would. You can't tell what you're doing till it's too late, it seems.'

Strange saying from that young father, till afterwards it was made too clear!

Betty recovered quickly and was out within three weeks.

Jim seemed to have long leave, for he was still about, but I had little talk with him, for, though always friendly, he seemed shy of me, and as to talking of the war – not a word! One evening I passed him and Betty leaning on a gate, close to the river – a warm evening of early July, when the Somme battle was at its height. Out there hell incarnate; and here intense peace, the quietly flowing river, the willows, and unstirring
aspens, the light slowly dying, and those two young things, with their arms round each other and their heads close together – her bobbed dark hair and Jim's reddish mop, getting quite long! I took good care not to disturb them. His last night, perhaps, before he went back into the furnace!

‘Oh, sir, come quick! They've 'rested Jim.'

As we went over she told me:

‘Oh, sir, I was afraid there was some mistake about his leave – it was so long; I thought he'd get into trouble over it, so I asked Bill Pateman' – (the village constable)–‘and now they've come and 'rested him for deserting. Oh! What have I done? What have I done?'

Outside the Roofes' cottage Jim was standing between a corporal's guard, and Betty flung herself into his arms. Inside I could hear Mrs Roofe expostulating with the corporal, and the baby crying. In the sleeping quiet of the village street, smelling of hay just harvested, it was atrocious.

I spoke to Jim. He answered quietly, in her arms:

‘I asked for leave, but they wouldn't give it. I had to come. I couldn't stick it, knowing how it was with her.'

‘Where was your regiment?'

‘In the line.'

‘Good God!'

Just then the corporal came out. I took him apart.

‘I was his schoolmaster, Corporal,' I said. ‘The poor chap joined up when he was just sixteen–he's still under age, you see; and now he's got this child-wife and a newborn baby!'

The corporal nodded; his face was twitching, a lined, decent face with a moustache.

‘I know, sir,'he muttered. ‘I know. Cruel work, but I've got to take him. He'll have to go back to France.'

‘What does it mean?'

He lifted his arms from his sides and let them drop, and that
gesture was somehow the most expressive and dreadful I ever saw.

‘Deserting in face of the enemy,' he whispered hoarsely. ‘Bad business! Can you get that girl away, sir?'

But Jim himself undid the grip of her arms and held her from him. Bending, he kissed her hair and face, then, with a groan, he literally pushed her into my arms and marched straight off between the guard.

And I was left in the dark, sweet-scented street with that distracted child struggling in my grasp.

‘Oh, my God! My God! My God!' Over and over and over. And what could one say or do?

‘Better for the poor girl to know the worst,' she said, ‘if it is the worst. The anxiety's killin''er.'

But I had no news and could not get any at Headquarters. The thing was being dealt with in France. Never was the scale and pitch of the world's horror more brought home to me. This deadly little tragedy was as nothing – just a fragment of straw whirling round in that terrible wind.

And then one day I did get news – a letter from the chaplain – and seeing what it was I stuck it in my pocket and sneaked down to the river – literally afraid to open it till I was alone.
Crouched up there, with my back to a haystack, I took it out with trembling fingers.

I had known it. Poor Jim! Poor Betty! Poor, poor Betty! I read on:

He stood up well at the end! I can see him yet, poor impulsive Jim. Desertion, but not cowardice, by the Lord! No one who looked into those straight, blue eyes could believe that. But they bandaged them, I suppose. Well! a bullet in a billet more or less; what was it in that wholesale slaughter? As a raindrop on a willow tree drips into the river and away to sea – so that boy, like a million others, dripped to dust. A little ironical though, that his own side should shoot him, who went to fight for them two years before he need, to shoot him who wouldn't be legal food for powder for another month! A little ironical, perhaps, that he had left this son – legacy to such an implacable world! But there's no moral to a true tale like this – unless it be that the rhythm of life and death cares not a jot for any of us!

To ride on these cars is always an adventure. Since we are in war-time, the drivers are men unfit for active service: cripples
and hunchbacks. So they have the spirit of the devil in them. The ride becomes a steeple-chase. Hurray! we have leaped in a clear jump over the canal bridges – now for the four-lane corner. With a shriek and a trail of sparks we are clear again. To be sure, a tram often leaps the rails – but what matter! It sits in a ditch till other trams come to haul it out. It is quite common for a car, packed with one solid mass of living people, to come to a dead halt in the midst of unbroken blackness, the heart of nowhere on a dark night, and for the driver and the girl conductor to call, ‘All get off – car's on fire!' Instead, however, of rushing out in a panic, the passengers stolidly reply: ‘Get on – get on! We're not coming out. We're stopping where we are. Push on, George.' So till flames actually appear.

The reason for this reluctance to dismount is that the nights are howlingly cold, black, and windswept, and a car is a haven of refuge. From village to village the miners travel, for a change of cinema, of girl, of pub. The trams are desperately packed. Who is going to risk himself in the black gulf outside, to wait perhaps an hour for another tram, then to see the forlorn notice ‘Depôt Only,' because there is something wrong! Or to greet a unit of three bright cars all so tight with people that they sail past with a howl of derision. Trams that pass in the night.

This, the most dangerous tram-service in England, as the authorities themselves declare, with pride, is entirely conducted by girls, and driven by rash young men, a little crippled, or by delicate young men, who creep forward in terror. The girls are fearless young hussies. In their ugly blue uniform, skirts up to their knees, shapeless old peaked caps on their heads, they have all the
sang-froid
of an old non-commissioned officer. With a tram packed with howling colliers, roaring hymns downstairs and a sort of antiphony of obscenities upstairs, the lasses are perfectly at their ease. They pounce on the youths who try to evade their ticket-machine. They push off the men at the end of their distance. They are not going to be done in the eye – not they. They fear nobody – and everybody fears them.

‘Hello, Annie!'

‘Hello, Ted!'

‘Oh, mind my corn, Miss Stone. It's my belief you've got a heart of stone, for you've trod on it again.'

‘You should keep it in your pocket,' replies Miss Stone, and she goes sturdily upstairs in her high boots.

‘Tickets, please.'

She is peremptory, suspicious, and ready to hit first. She can hold her own against ten thousand. The step of that tram-car is her Thermopylae.
¹

Therefore, there is a certain wild romance aboard these cars – and in the sturdy bosom of Annie herself. The time for soft romance is in the morning, between ten o'clock and one, when things are rather slack: that is, except market-day and Saturday. Thus Annie has time to look about her. Then she often hops off her car and into a shop where she has spied something, while the driver chats in the main road. There is very good feeling between the girls and the drivers. Are they not companions in peril, shipments aboard this careering vessel of a tram-car, for ever rocking on the waves of a stormy land?

Then, also, during the easy hours, the inspectors are most in evidence. For some reason, everybody employed in this tram-service is young: there are no grey heads. It would not do. Therefore the inspectors are of the right age, and one, the chief, is also good-looking. See him stand on a wet, gloomy morning, in his long oil-skin, his peaked cap well down over his eyes, waiting to board a car. His face is ruddy, his small brown moustache is weathered, he has a faint impudent smile. Fairly tall and agile, even in his waterproof, he springs aboard a car and greets Annie.

‘Hello, Annie! Keeping the wet out?'

‘Trying to.'

There are only two people in the car. Inspecting is soon over. Then for a long and impudent chat on the foot-board, a good, easy, twelve-mile chat.

The inspector's name is John Thomas Raynor – always called John Thomas, except sometimes, in malice, Coddy.
²
His face sets in fury when he is addressed, from a distance, with this abbreviation. There is considerable scandal about John Thomas in half a dozen villages. He flirts with the girl conductors in the
morning, and walks out with them in the dark night, when they leave their tram-car at the depôt. Of course, the girls quit the service frequently. Then he flirts and walks out with the newcomer: always providing she is sufficiently attractive, and that she will consent to walk. It is remarkable, however, that most of the girls are quite comely, they are all young, and this roving life aboard the car gives them a sailor's dash and recklessness. What matter how they behave when the ship is in port? Tomorrow they will be aboard again.

Annie, however, was something of a Tartar, and her sharp tongue had kept John Thomas at arm's length for many months. Perhaps, therefore, she liked him all the more: for he always came up smiling, with impudence. She watched him vanquish one girl, then another. She could tell by the movement of his mouth and eyes, when he flirted with her in the morning, that he had been walking out with this lass, or the other, the night before. A fine cock-of-the-walk he was. She could sum him up pretty well.

In this subtle antagonism they knew each other like old friends, they were as shrewd with one another almost as man and wife. But Annie had always kept him sufficiently at arm's length. Besides, she had a boy of her own.

The Statutes fair,
³
however, came in November, at Bestwood. It happened that Annie had the Monday night off. It was a drizzling ugly night, yet she dressed herself up and went to the fair-ground. She was alone, but she expected soon to find a pal of some sort.

The roundabouts were veering round and grinding out their music, the side shows were making as much commotion as possible. In the cocoanut shies there were no cocoanuts, but artificial war-time substitutes, which the lads declared were fastened into the irons. There was a sad decline in brilliance and luxury. None the less, the ground was muddy as ever, there was the same crush, the press of faces lighted up by the flares and the electric lights, the same smell of naphtha and a few fried potatoes, and of electricity.

Who should be the first to greet Miss Annie on the showground but John Thomas. He had a black overcoat buttoned
up to his chin, and a tweed cap pulled down over his brows, his face between was ruddy and smiling and handy as ever. She knew so well the way his mouth moved.

She was very glad to have a ‘boy'. To be at the Statutes without a fellow was no fun. Instantly, like the gallant he was, he took her on the Dragons, grim-toothed, round-about switchbacks. It was not nearly so exciting as a tram-car actually. But, then, to be seated in a shaking, green dragon, uplifted above the sea of bubble faces, careering in a rickety fashion in the lower heavens, whilst John Thomas leaned over her, his cigarette in his mouth, was after all the right style. She was a plump, quick, alive little creature. So she was quite excited and happy.

John Thomas made her stay on for the next round. And therefore she could hardly for shame repulse him when he put his arm round her and drew her a little nearer to him, in a very warm and cuddly manner. Besides, he was fairly discreet, he kept his movement as hidden as possible. She looked down, and saw that his red, clean hand was out of sight of the crowd. And they knew each other so well. So they warmed up to the fair.

After the dragons they went on the horses. John Thomas paid each time, so she could but be complaisant. He, of course, sat astride on the outer horse – named Black Bess – and she sat sideways, towards him, on the inner horse – named Wildfire. But of course John Thomas was not going to sit discreetly on Black Bess, holding the brass bar. Round they spun and heaved, in the light. And round he swung on his wooden steed, flinging one leg across her mount, and perilously tipping up and down, across the space, half lying back, laughing at her. He was perfectly happy; she was afraid her hat was on one side, but she was excited.

He threw quoits on a table, and won for her two large, pale-blue hat-pins. And then, hearing the noise of the cinemas, announcing another performance, they climbed the boards and went in.

Of course, during these performances pitch darkness falls from time to time, when the machine goes wrong. Then there
is a wild whooping, and a loud smacking of simulated kisses. In these moments John Thomas drew Annie towards him. After all, he had a wonderfully warm, cosy way of holding a girl with his arm, he seemed to make such a nice fit. And, after all, it was pleasant to be so held: so very comforting and cosy and nice. He leaned over her and she felt his breath on her hair; she knew he wanted to kiss her on the lips. And, after all, he was so warm and she fitted in to him so softly. After all, she wanted him to touch her lips.

But the light sprang up; she also started electrically, and put her hat straight. He left his arm lying nonchalantly behind her. Well, it was fun, it was exciting to be at the Statutes with John Thomas.

When the cinema was over they went for a walk across the dark, damp fields. He had all the arts of love-making. He was especially good at holding a girl, when he sat with her on a stile in the black, drizzling darkness. He seemed to be holding her in space, against his own warmth and gratification. And his kisses were soft and slow and searching.

So Annie walked out with John Thomas, though she kept her own boy dangling in the distance. Some of the tram-girls chose to be huffy. But there, you must take things as you find them, in this life.

There was no mistake about it, Annie liked John Thomas a good deal. She felt so rich and warm in herself whenever he was near. And John Thomas really liked Annie, more than usual. The soft, melting way in which she could flow into a fellow, as if she melted into his very bones, was something rare and good. He fully appreciated this.

But with a developing acquaintance there began a developing intimacy. Annie wanted to consider him a person, a man; she wanted to take an intelligent interest in him, and to have an intelligent response. She did not want a mere nocturnal presence, which was what he was so far. And she prided herself that he could not leave her.

Here she made a mistake. John Thomas intended to remain a nocturnal presence; he had no idea of becoming an all-round individual to her. When she started to take an intelligent interest
in him and his life and his character, he sheered off. He hated intelligent interest. And he knew that the only way to stop it was to avoid it. The possessive female was aroused in Annie. So he left her.

It is no use saying she was not surprised. She was at first startled, thrown out of her count. For she had been so
very
sure of holding him. For a while she was staggered, and everything became uncertain to her. Then she wept with fury, indignation, desolation, and misery. Then she had a spasm of despair. And then, when he came, still impudently, on to her car, still familiar, but letting her see by the movement of his head that he had gone away to somebody else for the time being, and was enjoying pastures new, then she determined to have her own back.

She had a very shrewd idea what girls John Thomas had taken out. She went to Nora Purdy. Nora was a tall, rather pale, but well-built girl, with beautiful yellow hair. She was rather secretive.

‘Hey!' said Annie, accosting her; then softly, ‘Who's John Thomas on with now?'

‘I don't know,' said Nora.

‘Why tha does,' said Annie, ironically lapsing into dialect. ‘Tha knows as well as I do.'

‘Well, I do, then,' said Nora. ‘It isn't me, so don't bother.'

‘It's Cissy Meakin, isn't it?'

‘It is, for all I know.'

‘Hasn't he got a face on him!' said Annie. ‘I don't half like his cheek. I could knock him off the foot-board when he comes round at me.'

‘He'll get dropped-on one of these days,' said Nora.

‘Aye, he will, when somebody makes up their mind to drop it on him. I should like to see him taken down a peg or two, shouldn't you?'

‘I shouldn't mind,' said Nora.

‘You've got quite as much cause to as I have,' said Annie. ‘But we'll drop on him one of these days, my girl. What? Don't you want to?'

‘I don't mind,' said Nora.

But as a matter of fact, Nora was much more vindictive than Annie.

One by one Annie went the round of the old flames. It so happened that Cissy Meakin left the tramway service in quite a short time. Her mother made her leave. Then John Thomas was on the
qui-vive
.
⁴
He cast his eyes over his old flock. And his eyes lighted on Annie. He thought she would be safe now. Besides, he liked her.

She arranged to walk home with him on Sunday night. It so happened that her car would be in the depôt at half past nine: the last car would come in at 10.15. So John Thomas was to wait for her there.

At the depôt the girls had a little waiting-room of their own. It was quite rough, but cosy, with a fire and an oven and a mirror, and table and wooden chairs. The half-dozen girls who knew John Thomas only too well had arranged to take service this Sunday afternoon. So, as the cars began to come in, early, the girls dropped into the waiting-room. And instead of hurrying off home, they sat around the fire and had a cup of tea. Outside was the darkness and lawlessness of war-time.

John Thomas came on the car after Annie, at about a quarter to ten. He poked his head easily into the girls' waiting-room.

‘Prayer-meeting?' he asked.

‘Aye,' said Laura Sharp. ‘Ladies only.'

‘That's me!' said John Thomas. It was one of his favourite exclamations.

‘Shut the door, boy,' said Muriel Baggaley.

‘On which side of me?' said John Thomas.

‘Which tha likes,' said Polly Birkin.