The Heart of the Family (4 page)

Luke took his role as corporal very seriously. His men, their safety and the proper execution of whatever work they were given to do were his responsibility.

Clancy brought the machine to a halt and then
activated the large ‘shovel’ to grab some of the rubble, swinging it over to the waiting truck.

The American soldiers cheered as the claws opened and deposited the rubble into the lorry.

‘Hey, buddy, here’s twenty bucks says you can’t clear the lot in ten minutes,’ the sergeant yelled, as a second load was added to the first, and then a third.

‘He can’t do that,’ Luke protested. ‘There’s a weight limit on those trucks. The axles won’t stand up to them being overloaded.’

Strictly speaking the British driver of the truck wasn’t under Luke’s command and was in any case a civilian. Luke, though, wasn’t about to stand to one side whilst the truck driver was placed in danger, and he could see that that was going to happen.

‘Hey, buddy,’ the sergeant slapped Luke on the shoulder, ‘This is the US Army you’re dealing with now, and we say there ain’t no such thing as can’t.’

The American soldier in the cab of the earth-moving vehicle was grinning as he yelled back, ‘You’re on, Sarge. Watch this.’

Angry now, Luke warned the sergeant, ‘Look, you’ve got to stop this. There’s at least two full loads and maybe three there. It’s impossible to get it all into one truck.’

Ignoring Luke’s warning, the sergeant called up to the driver, ‘Go to it, Clancy. Let’s show these Brits what being American is all about.’

Luke was in danger of losing his temper. ‘Any fool can see that there’s too much there to go in one truck, and that it’s asking for trouble to try,’ he insisted.

‘Hey, buddy, you’re the one who’ll be asking for trouble. See these stripes?’ the sergeant told Luke. ‘They say sergeant in any man’s language. Now go watch how we clear the roads in America – and that’s an order, soldier.’

Luke could feel his face burning with humiliation and fury. They both knew that the American had no authority over him, but the damage had been done and he had humiliated Luke in front of Luke’s own men as well as his own.

Walking away from him Luke went over to where Andy was leaning on his shovel, watching grimly as the lorry was heaped with load after load of rubble.

‘Go and find whoever’s in charge of the nearest ARP unit for me,’ Luke told him. ‘Perhaps Mr Know-it-all back there will listen to him—’ He broke off as suddenly the lorry buckled and then tilted, calling out a warning to its civilian driver, who had been standing a couple of feet away, smoking. But it was already too late and the man’s screams as the lorry fell on top of him were filling the street.

Luke and his men ran towards the scene. The collapsed lorry had disgorged its contents, covering the street in the debris they had spent four hours clearing up, but none of them gave that a second thought as they rushed to the aid of the suddenly silent driver.

Luke had known that there would be nothing they could do – the full weight of the lorry had fallen sideways onto the driver – but he and his men still worked frantically to lift it.

The American sergeant’s voice was thin and strained with shock as he muttered, ‘How the hell did that happen?’

Luke turned to look at him, saying fiercely, ‘You killed him. You know that, don’t you,
Sergeant
.’

‘It was an accident. We were trying to help.’ For such a big man, now he seemed oddly diminished and very afraid, but Luke was in no mood to show him any mercy.

‘No, you were trying to win a bet,’ said Luke coldly.

Inwardly he was shaking with a mixture of savage fury and despair. Hadn’t the city lost enough lives without this? But what did these Americans know? How could they understand? They weren’t even in the war.

Even though it was now late morning, the small rest centre where Jean worked as a volunteer as part of her WVS duties, handing out cups of tea and offering words of comfort to those who needed them, was packed with people who had been bombed out in other parts of the city, and whose local rest centres had been demolished along with their homes.

Jean had to squeeze her way past them, calming the fraught nerves of people queuing, who thought she was trying to jump in front of them by showing them her WVS badge and explaining that she was on her way to the kitchen to relieve one of her colleagues. The heartfelt apologies that followed her explanation brought her close to tears. People were so frightened and so grateful for even the smallest amount of help.

‘Jean, thank goodness you’re here.’ Noreen Smith, who was in charge of their small group, sighed in relief when Jean finally made it through to the small kitchen. ‘We’ve been rushed off our feet, with last night’s bombing. Bootle got hit ever so bad and we’ve got folk coming in from there with nothing apart from what they’re standing up in. I don’t know how
the city’s going to cope, I really don’t, what with so many roads blocked, and no proper supplies or outside help able to get in.’

‘Well, my Sam and our Luke will be doing their best to get the roads cleared, along with everyone else on clearing-up duties, that I do know,’ Jean told her stoutly, a small frown creasing her forehead when she remembered that just before he had left for work this morning Sam had told her that there was something he wanted to discuss with her.

‘What is it?’ she had asked him but he had shaken his head and told her gruffly, ‘There isn’t time now. They’ll be waiting for me down at the depot.’ ‘Sam …’ she had protested, but he had shaken his head, making clear that he wasn’t going to be coaxed into saying any more.

‘I don’t doubt that,’ Noreen was saying, dragging Jean’s attention back. ‘We’ve all seen the way in which everyone’s turned to and got on with things.’ She shook her head, her composure suddenly slipping as she added, ‘Even my Frank is saying now that we can’t hold out much longer.’

The two women exchanged mutually understanding looks as Jean removed her coat and hung it up.

Every rest centre had a store of second-hand clothes and blankets it was able to hand out to those in need to tide them over. The rule was that all blankets had to be returned as soon as Government coupons and fresh papers had been supplied, so that they could be put back in store for the next person in need, but as Noreen had pointed out two nights ago, increasingly people weren’t returning the blankets, because they were virtually all they had. The council
was doing its best, but the sheer number of people being made homeless meant that supplies were running out.

‘At least we had that convoy of Queen’s Messengers get in from Manchester before the roads got blocked,’ Noreen told Jean.

The Queen’s Messengers was the name given to a mobile canteen service provided by the Queen, with convoys based all over the country, staffed by the WVS and ready to rush to any emergency where food was required.

‘And it’s a mercy that they did. I don’t know how they’d have gone on in Bootle if they hadn’t, from what my Frank’s said.’

Noreen’s husband, Frank, worked for the Gas Company, and like Jean’s Sam he was spending long hours helping to repair bomb damage.

‘From what I’ve heard they nearly got bombed themselves,’ Jean told her.

‘Where’s that billeting officer?’ Noreen continued. ‘She’s normally here by now.’

On the morning after a bombing raid every rest centre that was operational and not bomb damaged received a visit from one of the City Council’s billeting officers, carrying with her lists of available accommodation.

‘It’s all very well the council saying that no one’s ever had to spend a second night at a rest centre on account of them finding them accommodation, but what about all them trekkers?’

In her indignation Noreen’s voice lost its careful gentility, her accent becoming stronger.

‘And don’t tell me that it’s not them that’s responsible for all our blankets disappearing. After all,
blankets don’t just walk out by themselves, do they? No. It’s not right, that’s what I say. No decent folk would want to go roaming around the countryside sleeping in barns and that, like that lot do. Stands to reason, doesn’t it, if they choose to do that when the council says it can find them a proper roof over their heads?’

‘I wouldn’t fancy it myself,’ Jean admitted, ‘but then I haven’t been bombed out, and we’ve had some in here that have had that happen to them more than once. I dare say there’s some folk that are just too plain afraid to stay in the city at night.’

‘That’s all very well, but in that case they should stay in the country and not come back here expecting to be fed and taking our blankets.’

Noreen was normally a good-natured soul and Jean suspected that her current snappiness could be put down to the strain they were all feeling.

It was also true that there was some hostility to and suspicion of the trekkers, as they were unofficially called, with some people even suggesting that their number included men who were trying to avoid conscription.

From what Jean had seen, though, they seemed decent enough sorts, albeit from the poorer dock area of the city, which had been more heavily bombed, with a lot of them coming in to work during the day before trekking back out to the country at night.

‘I’ve even heard as how the City’s putting on special trucks and handing out tickets to them for places on them, to get them out at night.’

If that was true surely it must mean that the city was in an even more desperate situation than anyone was saying, Jean thought worriedly. The only reason
the council could have for encouraging them to leave at night had to be because they couldn’t provide accommodation for them because so many buildings had been destroyed.

Removing her hat-pin, then taking off her hat and putting it on the shelf above her coat, Jean reached for her apron, ready to relieve the WVS volunteer who was manning the tea urn.

After the first and even the second night of bombing the mood of those who had come to the rest centres had been defiant and determinedly cheerful. Jokes had been cracked and heads had been held high, but now that had all changed, Jean acknowledged as she poured a cup of tea for an exhausted-looking young woman with three small children clinging to her side.

‘’Ere, get a move on wi’ them kids, will yer?’ the woman next to her grumbled, impatient for her own cup of tea, and moving up before the young woman could get out of the way properly, accidentally jarring her arm so that her precious cup of tea was spilled.

Tears filled the young woman’s eyes.

‘Don’t worry, love,’ Jean tried to comfort her, pouring her a fresh cup of tea. ‘The billeting officer will be here soon and get you sorted out.’

The young woman gave a hiccuping sob and shook her head. ‘He’ll be lucky if he can do that.’ She was shaking now.

Catching Noreen’s eye, Jean murmured, ‘Stand in for me for a few minutes, will you, Noreen love, whilst I see what’s to do?’

It was recognised amongst their group that Jean, with her motherly manner, had a way of dealing with situations like this one so Noreen nodded, allowing
Jean to leave her post to usher the young woman and her children into the back room, where she offered her a seat on one of its battered hard wooden chairs.

The young woman shook her head again. ‘I darsen’t ’cos if I sit down I reckon I’ll never want to get up again. It’s bin three nights now since we had any proper sleep. Me and the kids were living with my hubby’s mam, but she got fed up, what wi’ the little one crying, and then me and her had words, and she said we had to leave. She’s never liked me. Then we went and stayed with my mam but she’s got our nan and me sisters there with her, and then when I tried to go back to my Ian’s mam’s I found out she’d been bombed. Half the street had gone.’

‘Our nan got killed by a bomb,’ the eldest child announced. ‘Served her right, it did, for throwing us out.’

He was too young to understand, of course, but his mother had gone bright red.

‘I wouldn’t really have wished her any harm, only she didn’t half wind me up and sometimes you say things you shouldn’t. My Ian will have something to say when he finds out. He’s bound to blame me, ’cos she was bad on her legs, you see, and she wouldn’t have gone to the shelter.’

Poor girl. How awful to have to carry that kind of burden of guilt, Jean thought sympathetically.

‘You mustn’t blame yourself,’ she told her. ‘And as for your husband having something to say, well, I reckon he’ll be too relieved to see that you and his kiddies are safe, to do anything but give you a big hug. That’s better,’ Jean smiled approvingly when the young woman took a deep breath and stopped crying.
‘You go and wait for the billeting officer, and no more tears.’

The girl – because she was only a girl really, Jean thought – was, plainly relieved to have got her guilt off her chest. Poor thing, Jean thought sympathetically as she ushered her back to the main hall.

But even though she had been listening to what the girl had had to say, Jean had still been thinking about what Sam had said to her this morning about wanting to have a talk with her.

The small knot of anxiety in her stomach tightened. She was pretty sure she knew what it was Sam wanted to say, but she hoped that she was wrong.

‘Charles’s release papers arrived this morning,’ Vi told Bella in a pleased voice, indicating in the direction of the front-room, where an official-looking buff envelope was propped up on the mantelpiece, against the clock. ‘And about time too, with less than a month to go to the wedding. Your poor father hasn’t been home for the last four nights and it will be a relief to him once Charles is out of the army and back here in Wallasey working for him. You’re going to have to get your skates on, Bella, about getting your things moved back here and the house left nice for Daphne and Charles.’

Bella’s mouth compressed. She wasn’t at all pleased about being forced to give up her home to her brother and his wife-to-be.

‘It isn’t as simple as that,’ she to her mother. ‘I’ve got refugees billeted on me, remember.’

‘Haven’t you told them to find somewhere else yet?’

‘It isn’t up to me to tell them anything. Daddy will
have to tell the council, and they won’t be very happy, not with Jan being a bomber pilot and a war hero,’ Bella pointed out.

Vi gave her daughter a sharp look. The restrictions of the wartime diet, with its lack of protein and its hunger-appeasing carbohydrates, meant that Vi, like so many of the country’s older women, had put on weight around her mid section. As a family the Firths were luckier than most in that Edwin’s money and his contacts ensured that they were able to buy goods on the black market that others could not afford, when such goods were available, but everyone was beginning to feel the pinch now. Vi’s floral summer dress bought the previous year was straining slightly round her waist. Vi’s mouse-brown hair was also beginning to show touches of grey, although she still had it washed and set every week in the sculptured iron-hard waves she favoured. Her nails were painted with clear nail varnish, bought on the black market. The leader of Vi’s WVS group disapproved of the volunteers wearing nail polish at a time when the country was in such a dire position, although
Good Housekeeping
magazine was urging its readers to try to look their best to boost everyone’s morale.

Carefully checking one of her rigid waves with her fingertips, Vi warned, ‘There’s no point in you being difficult, Bella. It is your father who owns the house, after all, and I fully agree with him that it makes sense for Charles and Daphne to live there and for you to come home. Your father’s got enough to do as it is without having to sort out your refugees, and if I were you I wouldn’t risk getting on the wrong side of him. He’s been very generous
to you, and I do think you might show a bit more gratitude.’

Gratitude for what, Bella wanted to say – taking her home off her? But she had learned some hard lessons these last few weeks, and she knew that she could no longer rely on her mother’s support and indulgence.

She looked at her watch. ‘I must go. We’re having to double up as a rest centre as well as the crèche, and since Laura is still on leave visiting her parents, I’m in charge of everything.’

Laura Wright was in charge of running the government-organised crèche where Bella worked as her deputy.

A note of pride had crept into Bella’s voice. Against all the odds, during these last few days she had discovered that she not only had a talent for organisation but that she was also thriving on the need to get things done and make decisions. She had been up this morning at first light, hurrying out to the school, almost in one way actually rather thrilled to see the line of people forming outside – victims of the bombing in Liverpool who had made their way over the water to Wallasey, prepared to sleep rough if it meant a decent night’s sleep, and now patiently waiting for a hot drink.

Queuing with them had been ARP workers, and fire watchers, and Bella had dealt with everything and everyone with calm efficiency – until the mothers had started arriving, bringing their little ones to the crèche, and amongst them she had seen
him,
smiling at her as brazen as anything, just as though … as though what? Despite what she had told him he actually still expected her to go off for that weekend with him?