Always in My Heart (21 page)

‘We’ll both be at the mercy of the Army, Peg,’ interrupted Jim. ‘After a short retraining course in Yorkshire, we’ll be given our orders – and then we’ll know more about what we’ll be doing.’

Peggy poured some whisky into a clean glass, her hand trembling so badly that she spilled some on the oilcloth that covered the old table. ‘When do you have to leave?’ she said, the words barely audible through the lump in her throat.

‘Three days’ time,’ he replied, reaching for her hand.

‘But you can’t,’ she gasped. ‘Daisy and I need you here – and it’s too soon – much too soon.’

‘Ach,’ he said, making light of the situation. ‘That’s the Army for you, Peg. They say jump, and you ask how high.’

‘It’s not fair,’ she whispered. ‘You’ve already done your bit. Surely they won’t send you off to fight?’

‘It’s not something either of us relish,’ said Jim with brittle joviality, ‘but whatever they decide to do with us, this war will soon be over with me and Frank on the case, and I’ll be under your feet again before you know it.’

Peggy swallowed the whisky and felt it burn all the way down her throat and into her chest as she held tightly to Jim’s hand. Churchill had talked of sacrifice and courage – of remaining strong and stoic in the face of conflict. She had thought she had nothing else to give, but this was the sacrifice she had never believed she’d have to make. It was the same sacrifice that a million women had made before her, and yet the man she’d loved for so long was facing an even harder challenge, and in that moment of awful clarity, she realised she must dredge up all her courage and fortitude and keep smiling through.

Despite the amount of whisky he’d drunk, Jim remained stone-cold sober, and after Frank had left the house to stagger back home across the hills, he’d telephoned Somerset, and had managed to speak to his
sons and daughter for a few precious minutes before the pips went and he was cut off.

There were tears in his eyes as he replaced the receiver, and Peggy took him in her arms and held him until he was more himself again.

‘Bob and Charlie were full of questions,’ he said as they returned to the kitchen. Peggy noticed thankfully that Daisy had drifted back to sleep again. ‘But our Anne was trying hard not to cry – I could hear it in her voice.’

‘There’ll be plenty of tears, Jim, but it’s only because we love you so much,’ she murmured. ‘Oh Jim,’ she sighed. ‘What on earth am I going to do without you?’

He pulled her onto his lap as he sat by the range. ‘You’ll do as you’ve always done,’ he said softly. ‘You’ll work like a trooper and battle away, worrying over everyone and everything until you’re so tired you’ll fall into a deep sleep and not have time to think.’

He ran his finger down the line of her cheek and grinned. ‘You’ll not have me snoring in your ear, or getting under your feet – and I’ll not be run ragged trying to do all the jobs you set for me.’

‘I’ve yet to see you break out in a sweat to do any of the jobs around here,’ she said with mock severity. ‘I’m still waiting for the bedroom windows to be fixed so they don’t let in the draught and rattle all night.’

His dark eyes twinkled as he held her close. ‘Perhaps we ought to go and check on those bedroom windows – just to see if there’s anything I can do to stop them from rattling.’

She knew that look in his eye and giggled. ‘Oh, I think that’s a very good idea,’ she murmured.

He gathered her into his arms and carried her out through the hall and into the bedroom, nudging the door closed behind him.

The
Monarch of the Glen
had been stripped to the bare minimum so she could carry thousands of troops and their equipment to the world’s trouble spots. There were 1,500 women and children on board after she’d left Singapore, and it soon became clear that the Captain and his crew had done their best to accommodate them despite the lack of comfortable facilities.

The first few hours on board had been tearful and rather frightening after that Japanese air attack, and, like the others, Sarah and Jane were disorientated and heartsick at leaving their loved ones behind. The crew were kind but firm as they ordered everyone to put on their life jackets and make a bundle of essentials in case they had to quickly board a lifeboat. They were herded down below deck where hundreds of mattresses had been laid on the floor, and told that this was where they would have to stay until the danger of enemy attack was past.

It was dark and poorly ventilated below deck, with the noise of hundreds of frightened children and
bewildered women drowning out the steady thud of the ship’s great engines. But this precautionary measure proved wise, for within hours of sailing they’d heard the shrill blast of the ship’s air-raid siren. The Japanese bombers had returned to finish what they’d started back in Singapore harbour.

Sarah and Jane had clung together as they felt the ship zigzag to avoid their attackers. Bombs exploded all around them and the ship’s guns boomed out, making the hull of the ship resonate with the noise. There were muffled gasps of fear, the wail of a baby and the terrified cries of toddlers, but everyone kept a tight hold on their terror, knowing it would spread like a forest fire and consume them all if it was released.

The attack seemed to last for hours as they sat there in the darkness, but the all-clear finally sounded and there was an audible sigh of relief as the ship continued on her way.

Two more days and nights passed down in the bowels of the ship, and like the other women, Sarah and Jane tried to make the best of things, and not dwell on the possibility that they could be shadowed by an enemy submarine, or that the Japs would attack them again. Pushing the mattresses together, Sarah sorted through their cases and used their jackets to make the emergency bundles they would have to carry everywhere. The dresses with their few pieces of jewellery sewn into the hems were carefully rolled alongside the small box of first-aid supplies Amah had insisted they take, and they added cardigans and spare
sun hats, and the precious book which contained all the family photographs. Tying the bundles with thick string, Sarah warned Jane that she must never let her bundle out of sight.

The mood below deck was anxious and rather depressed, but when morning came on the third day they were released from the cloying darkness of their prison, and they poured gratefully onto the decks and breathed in the sea breeze, lifting their faces to the warm sun as hundreds of children raced about the decks in the sheer joy of being free again.

Sarah held Jane’s hand as they stood next to their bundles and life jackets and looked out at the ocean which stretched to every horizon. ‘I want to go home,’ whispered Jane.

‘So do I,’ murmured Sarah, as she put her arm round her sister’s shoulder. ‘But we can’t, not until the Japanese have been beaten.’

‘Do you think our house and the plantation are still there? I miss my bedroom, and Amah and my lizard,’ Jane said, her voice wavering as she tried to quell her tears. ‘But most of all I miss Mummy and Daddy. Do you think Mummy’s better now? Will she be on a ship too?’

Sarah couldn’t answer her questions. She was still feeling bewildered by the speed and urgency of their departure – afraid for the home she’d lost and the way of life which had been so cruelly snatched away from her. She didn’t know what was happening back in Singapore, if her mother had recovered and had had
the baby – or if her father and Philip were at this very moment engaged in battle against the invaders – and it was this not knowing that increased her anxiety.

‘We must be brave, Jane,’ she said as her sister rested her head on her shoulder. ‘Pops is trusting us to do the best we can, and once we’re in England we’ll be able to write to him, and he’ll send us news of Mother.’

She gave Jane a handkerchief to dry her eyes. ‘Singapore will not have to fight alone for long,’ she soothed. ‘The Allies will soon come to their aid, and then the Japanese will be sent packing once and for all.’

Sarah and Jane had been billeted down in the hold along with the other single women and older children – the cabins had been allocated to mothers with babies and toddlers. But as they explored the ship, they discovered that the conditions in the cabins weren’t that much more comfortable. Strangers had to share the small spaces, often with several children, and the portholes had been painted black and were tightly locked. It was hardly surprising that everyone preferred being on deck during the day.

Clearly discipline and order had to be maintained, and the women were given what appeared to be an endless list of rules. Like most of the others, Sarah and Jane realised that many of these rules were there to protect them and happily complied. But the hundreds of children on board saw only new challenges, and the rule about never climbing on the railings was frequently disobeyed.

The punishment was swift and effective, meted out by a huge bosun who constantly patrolled the decks. Plucking off the offenders, he administered a good spanking, popped a sweet in the squalling mouths and sent them on their way. The railings were swiftly abandoned as climbing frames.

A sort of order began to emerge as the days passed. Meals were taken on benches in the vast dining room where long trestle tables stretched from one end of the room to the other. The food was nutritious, if a bit predictable, and consisted of stews that were served from huge tureens and accompanied by rice. But there was always fruit to be had, on the strict understanding that not a banana skin, bit of peel or apple core – indeed, absolutely nothing – should be tossed overboard. An enemy plane could spot the floating jetsam and pinpoint their position for their submarines.

With so many children on board the noise was deafening, and it was soon decided to rope off an area of the deck for them so they wouldn’t disturb everyone else. It was also decided that they should have two hours of schooling a day, and Sarah and Jane volunteered to help the teachers, who were rather swamped by the sheer number of pupils. Jane did sums with the little ones, while Sarah helped with reading and writing, but it was all very pleasant, for they sat beneath large awnings on deck as the cool breeze drifted from the sea.

Shipboard life was peaceful and ordered, and Sarah enjoyed being kept busy as she helped in the dining
room, taught the children and organised deck games with Jane and some of the older girls. And then, just as she was starting to feel more relaxed about things, the women were gathered together in the dining room one evening, and told by the grim-faced Captain that Singapore had fallen and that the Japanese were now advancing on Java, Sumatra, Borneo and Indonesia.

A deep despondency fell over everyone, and it seemed that the blackout on board was more profound than ever that night, and down in the hull there was the sound of muffled sobbing as the women wept over the unknown fate of their men.

Sarah had comforted Jane by telling her that their parents would have escaped in time, but once Jane was asleep, Sarah shed her tears into her pillow. She so wanted to believe that her mother had managed to get on a ship out of Singapore before the fall – and that Philip and her father had somehow managed to avoid capture. There were junks and sampans everywhere, yachts and motor boats at anchor in the Marina that surely could be put to use as a means of escape. Thousands of small islands surrounded Singapore – perhaps they’d managed to evade the Japs and were even now sailing towards safety.

She knew in her heart that it was wishful thinking, but she refused to listen to that small voice of reason and doggedly remained hopeful – for if she gave in to doubt, she would be lost.

Determined to keep their spirits up, she and Jane volunteered for even the most menial of tasks, and at
the end of each long, hot day they would fall asleep almost the moment their heads touched their pillows, exhausted from their toil and lulled by the steady thrum of the ship’s great engines.

There were women they knew from Kuala Lumpur and Singapore on board, and it seemed the will to survive and overcome adversity with as little fuss and complaint as possible had infected them too, and soon everyone was putting on a brave face and making the best of things.

The routine on board rarely changed, with school in the morning, daily boat-drill and the occasional talk given by someone who had an interesting tale to tell. As friendships were made and the women organised themselves, the atmosphere lightened and it felt as if they were on a cruise. Everyone seemed to have their special place to sit on the decks on their emergency bundles rather than their life jackets, as they could be quickly damaged in the hot sun. And as the ship drew ever closer to Ceylon, there was an air of excitement which was quite infectious, for few of them had ever been there.

The precious time had slipped away and now it was Jim’s last day at home. Peggy was trying her best to remain positive and cheerful – and to indelibly print the images of those treasured few hours in her mind so she could relive them whilst he was away.

But the reminders of his leaving were everywhere – in the Home Guard uniform she was pressing; in the highly polished boots that waited on a square of newspaper by the door; in the kitbag and rifle that stood in the corner of their bedroom – and in the empty spaces on their dressing table where his brushes and nail-kit had always been.

Jim and Ron seemed to be dealing with this dreaded departure in their own inimitable way. They had left the house very early and returned with sacks of coal hidden beneath a large square of lino they’d draped over the wheelbarrow. They’d cut logs, stacked them next to the shed and covered them with a tarpaulin to keep the rain off, and then laid the new lino in the kitchen. Jim had actually fixed the rattling window and made a draught excluder with an old stocking that
he’d stuffed with newspaper, and then nailed on the bottom of the bedroom door.

Then he’d spent an hour just sitting with Daisy in his lap, watching her every move, as if he too was trying to absorb these memories to carry with him – and as Peggy watched in amazement, he did something she’d never seen him do before. He changed Daisy’s nappy and then warmed the bottle of milk she always had in the mornings now, and fed her. Once she was asleep, he’d tucked her into the pram, and then carried it down the steps so that he and Peggy could take their youngest daughter for an amble down to the seafront.