A Childs War (16 page)

As he dozed off to sleep, the sky grew dark again in spite of double Summer Time and the thunder re-commenced while a great, lumbering beast with horns, walking on its hind legs, lunged towards Alex with head lowered, intent on pinning him to the garden gate. The beast slobbered as it came towards him and its eyes rolled wildly in time to the lolling of its tongue. The roaring that issued from its mouth was terrifying and Alex stood before the gate defenceless as the point of the horn came nearer to his stomach. He opened his mouth to yell and found pressure not on his stomach but his shoulder as Edna shook him awake,

“Come on. Tea's on the table and your Dad's waiting to start.”

Edna was astonished by how eager he was to wash his hands in the bathroom and run downstairs. Once at the table, he hardly stopped talking and took a very long time to finish his food. He was pleased that George liked his joke about the leaves in the tree book.

He fell asleep again in an armchair very soon. In this dream the beast was being ridden by the bandmaster, who was using his baton to support the threat posed by the horns. This time it was George who rescued him and carried him “up the wooden hill”. As it was still light, he meant to read a story, but the book soon fell from his grasp. He fell asleep with neither bulls nor bandmasters to disturb him until it was light again and by then they were memories not threats.

George found that one of the benefits of taking over Graham's job was that he was also entitled to the leave he had accumulated. Edna's young sister Hetty had a husband whose job had taken him to Walney Island in what was described to Alex as The North. They had not been there very long, and one of the reasons for the move was that Geoff, Hetty's recently and quietly acquired husband, had been in the Auxiliary Fire Service all through the London blitz and took advantage of his position as a civil servant in the Admiralty to angle for a move to a place out of range of the Luftwaffe. The organizers of submarine production at Barrow-in-Furness had a vacancy. Geoff applied for it and was relieved and glad to be appointed. So now Hetty wrote to Edna suggesting that she and George and Alex should come for a summer holiday by the sea for ten days. The place had all the attractions of Blackpool and Morecambe Bay: true, the beaches were defended from possible invaders with rolls of barbed wire, but it would be a change for them and the sea air would do them good.

At the station with Alex the following Saturday afternoon, trying to ignore the notice that asked him whether his journey were really necessary, George found that the train journey to Barrow was possible, although it would involve three changes: at Birmingham, Warrington and Carnforth and, if they were to get there by six in the evening as he hoped, they would have to be at Oxford station at four in the morning. Some of the changes would involve long waits and the booking clerk pointed out that there was no guarantee that all lines across the West Midlands would be open and accessible to a passenger train. George thought it would be worth it and bought the two and a half return tickets. When they were put on the brass ledge at the front of the booking booth for George to take, Alex stood on tiptoe to see that there were three tickets that were the same colour and shape.

“Is one of them the half ticket?” he asked.

“Yes. That one,” said George, showing him the ticket that was for him.

“Why is it called a half, then?”

“Because you go for half the price of Mum and me.”

“Won't my bum take up just as much room on a seat though?”

“Of course it will, especially the way you fidget.”

“Why is my ticket a half, then?”

“So that poor and honest working men can take their families on trains from time to time.”

“Are you a poor and honest working man, Dad?”

“Good God Almighty!” said George.

“What's He got to do with it?” said Alex, mentally using a capital letter for the deity as Miss Cook had taught them in assembly.

“He gives fathers the strength they need to cope with the questions asked them by their sons.”

With that, they went home and told Edna the good news that she would see her sister and meet her new brother-in-law in a few days' time.

“All being well,” added George, taking the reservations put into his mind by the booking clerk very seriously.

“Four in the morning though, George!”

“What about it? I'll tell you what: we'll go to sleep in our clothes, all ready, and then we can just get up at three, have our breakfast and go.”

He meant it as a joke, but Edna thought it good sense. So they did it. All three slept on the big bed in the front room upstairs, still dressed, except that the only part of George to go to sleep after one o'clock was his arm because Alex was asleep lying on it. George did not want to wake him up or he would wake Edna and then he would be kept awake himself, because she had done nothing but worry about the journey out loud in the hour it had taken her to get to sleep at twelve.

So a bleary-eyed George was not displeased when the alarm clock went off, and he quickly shaved and re-packed his shaving tackle before locking the house securely as they went to the station, with Alex in awe of the stars in the sky and the silence in the main road.

After all the months with John's Meccano Magazines, of which Alex was sadly now deprived, actually to stand on a platform in the dark and see a fiery locomotive come into the station right in front of him was very thrilling indeed. George took him to inspect the great wheels and the pistons and, when they had got into the compartment and settled down, quietly explained how steam builds up to drive a piston, is condensed and then used again. As the train moved away, “There,” he said, “you can feel the surges of the steam, can't you?”

Alex could and was delighted that George should share his enthusiasm for what the engine driver and fireman were achieving while they sat here in comparative comfort and a dim wartime light. The carriage itself was interesting too, with its rich upholstery, the leather strap at the window and the brass lugs that went with it to keep the window open or shut as desired. The blinds were down as blackout on the side of the carriage where there was no corridor. Above the seats were framed photographs of seaside places and a castle and a sort of fishing net hung between brackets, upon which George had settled the big brown case and Edna had put the little case together with the shopping bag with the sandwiches and the thermos flask. Joyce had forgotten to take this last object out of the kitchen cupboard when she left.

“Come on, now,” said Edna. “Stop asking questions, and let Dad have some shut-eye. He didn't get much last night.”

“Why not?” asked the still excited Alex.

George could see that Edna was about to tell him about Alex keeping him awake by lying on his arm and his stare dared her to say anything. She quickly registered this and said to Alex, “Oh, never mind. Get some sleep yourself. It will be a long day and you'll need it.” Alex, perched by the window, realized that he would not be able to see anything until it was light and took her advice. This time George kept his arm firmly to his side, and smiled at Edna sitting opposite him.

“It may be a funny way of doing it,” he said to her. “But it's good to be going on holiday.”

“I hope so,” said Edna.

The changes of train were all successfully accomplished and George, after sleeping in his seat for two hours, pointed out things of interest as they passed them. Going through the midlands landscape, they were saddened to see a great deal of urban destruction. George commented:

“Look at the mess the bombing's made of all the industrial plant. I wonder if we shall ever be in a position to fight back.”

Later however, when they were passing through scenes of agriculture and wild land, morale improved under the inspiration of the bright sun on the landscape.

Hetty's husband met them at Barrow station in a car. He had a broad smile, though Edna saw that his teeth were detached from each other and tobacco stained. She thought his expression was shifty and the broad shouldered suit he wore flashy. She withheld her confidence in him, sensing that he was too much of a smooth operator. Nor did she warm to his attentions to her as he helped her into the front seat of the car, leaving George and Alex to take their places in the back where there was plenty of room for legs and luggage alike. She kept her right knee well away from his hand whenever she saw it moving towards the gear stick.

As far as Alex was concerned, Geoff was a real uncle, not a self-appointed one, and very soon he and Alex were on good terms. When opportunity arose, Alex asked,

“What kind of car is this, Uncle Geoff?”

“It's a 1934 Morris Ten Four. Don't run away with the idea that it's mine! I'm allowed to use it to get around the various operations we have here - and don't ask me anything about those because they're all very secret. I can sometimes manage to squeeze an extra journey out of the petrol tank if I'm careful.”

By this time they were crossing a strip of water to reach a village where he and Aunt Hetty lived near the sea. Alex had never knowingly seen the sea before. And there it was: grey under a cloudy sky past a beach made up of big grey stones that seemed to reflect it.

“On a clear day, you can see the Isle of Man,” Geoff told them as he turned a corner into the road where they would be staying for the next ten days.

Hetty was tall and angular, unlike Edna, who was no longer overweight but still fleshed out. She had long hair, fashionably cut, with its length flowing out of the back of the roll which many women now wore because they could set it up for themselves without recourse to a hairdresser.

“Here you are then!” was her greeting and she came to kiss her sister, to comment on how tall Alex had become and to hug George, who had always had a soft spot for his little sister-in-law.

“We've put you and George in here, Edna, and Alex has a bed in the attic room.” Their home was on one floor except for this little room built into the roof with a window that allowed a squint at the sea from one angle. Alex liked it and was pleased when George brought his clothes and a few of his books up so that he could make the room his own as he put them in the places assigned to them.

Food was ready on the table when he answered Hetty's call to come down and they all had a pleasant meal together. George expressed interest in the reason for Geoff being up here, knowing that naval shipbuilding was something that went on in the Barrow yards, but Geoff kept the information he was prepared to give very general.

“I'd like to take you round, George, but what we do here is so vital in combating the U-Boats that I'm not even allowed to tell myself where I'm going in the mornings!”

“Anyway,” put in his wife, “whatever you do is a damned sight easier than being at the office all day and then being on called out for the Fire Service, isn't it, Geoff?”

She turned to Edna, and went on, “D'you know, he didn't take his fireman's boots off for three days and nights over one weekend in the worst of the blitz and then they had to be cut off.”

George and Edna made sympathetic sounds in Geoff's direction as they ate.

Alex wanted to know more.

“What did you have to do then, Uncle?”

“I had to drive a big fire appliance as far as I could get it among the rubble, lend a hand with putting out fires, and after that we had to help as many people as we could.”

A distant look came into his face as he finished and he attacked his sardines in order not to say anything else. Aunt Hetty gently patted Alex's arm as he sat next to her and said quietly,

“Promise me not to ask him any more. He saw a lot of very nasty things and he can't talk about it, any more than he can tell you about his work here, though for different reasons. It was my silly fault for bringing the subject up.”

Alex felt sorry for a man who couldn't tell people about his achievements, but George's reaction to what he had said about the shipyards made him more appreciative about what might be in the locked new cupboard in the shed at home.

The silence was replaced by talk of family matters. Hetty produced the few photographs she had of her wedding day and told Edna all about re-styling one of her pre-war dresses for the occasion. Geoff asked if that was a picture of his wedding as well and, when reassured that it was, added apprehensively,

“I'm sorry it had to be a small occasion. We couldn't ask anyone to it because we did not know if we could keep the appointment ourselves even, on account of the raids and my fire service duties.”

“How did you feel about that?” Edna asked, remembering her own wedding under not dissimilar circumstances.

“Well, our Dad's gone on, so there was no one to give me away and Geoff's family are all in Australia. It was for us two, anyway. I feel fine about it! We've got the bit of paper and the registrar's signature. What more do you want for legal happiness?”

After that, George carefully steered their conversation into other, less sensitive, areas than marital bliss in wartime.

“I have to be at work tomorrow,” Geoff told them, “but there's the sea here and a few old bits of ruins that are worth a look at. Perhaps one day, George, you would like to take Alex into Barrow and just watch what's going on in a few places. Don't wear a leather overcoat and dark glasses under your trilby, though. I don't want to come and have to bail you out and Alex is far too young to be a spy!”

It was agreed that they would slough off the effects of the long journey the next day and then, while Hetty and Edna went their own way the day after, George would rediscover his maritime roots, even if it was a case of submarines rather than cruisers. What really mattered was to stop Jerry from sinking convoys. George wanted to believe that the allies were fighting back properly now. Information about that would be very heartening to him, especially in consideration of what he did most evenings after unlocking the secret cupboard in his shed when Alex had gone to bed and while Edna listened to the wireless in the living room. He hoped his little parcels of marine engine parts worked on the small lathe provided for the purpose and sent off each week in an approved manner were his small but vital contribution to the national war effort. In his own unofficial way, George was as patriotic as Horatio Nelson and as determined as the statesman from the past whom he had made his personal hero, William Pitt the Elder.