The September Girls (36 page)

‘I expect they are,’ Fergus said dryly. ‘How old are you?’

‘Fifteen. What’s your name, by the way? I’m Julian Mellor.’

‘Fergus Caffrey.’

Julian Mellor took a notebook and the stub of a pencil out of his blazer pocket and made a note of the name. ‘Are you Irish, Fergus?’

‘Liverpool Irish,’ Fergus grunted. He looked hungrily at the satchel. ‘Have you got anything to eat in there?’

‘I’ve only got chocolate left. It’s from the lunch Mum made me for school yesterday, I’ve been making it last out. Would you like some?’

‘Please.’

‘It’s a Mars bar. Here, have it all,’ he said impulsively. ‘We’re only a few miles from Dunkirk, then it’ll be home and proper meals again.’

‘Ta.’ Fergus licked his lips as he tore the paper away from the Mars bar and was about to bite into it when he became aware that a small boy had stopped in front of him and was staring longingly at the chocolate. The child’s face bore the expression of someone very much older, for he too had passed the old man and the dog, walked in the blood spilled on the road, witnessed the same terrifying sights as Fergus, except Fergus was twenty-five and this child looked no more than six or seven.

‘Marcel!’ A woman a few yards ahead who was wearily pushing a pram piled high with suitcases must have noticed the boy was no longer at her side. ‘Marcel!’ she called again. She wore high-heeled shoes, a pink flowered frock, a straw picture hat and lace gloves. Fergus wondered if there was a baby in the pram.

‘Here you are, kiddo.’ He thrust the chocolate at the boy.

‘
Merci, monsieur
,’ he said politely and ran to catch up with the woman.

‘Are we really only a few miles off Dunkirk?’ Fergus asked, thinking wistfully about the Mars bar.

‘About two or three. Whoa! Looks like we’re going to be strafed again. You’d better duck, Fergus.’

Fergus stared, transfixed, at the plane zooming towards them, so low that he could actually see the face of the pilot, see the goggles over his eyes. He never quite knew what came over him. It wasn’t courage, he was quite sure of that, but more a feeling of sheer foolhardiness when he saw the woman in front swerve the pram towards the ditch, so sharply that she knocked the Mars bar out of the little boy’s hand and he stooped to pick it up. Bullets were hitting the road in a dead straight line, raising little clouds of dust, and the line was heading straight towards the child.

With a roar that was a mixture of rage and despair, Fergus leapt forward, scooped up the lad in his arms and threw him into the ditch, landing on top of him with a thud that winded them both. Something bit his leg and he screamed at the same time as the little lad began to cry, not because he was hurt, but because he’d lost his Mars bar.

 

It had become a crazy world when you actually felt glad that you’d been shot in the leg and could no longer walk. It meant that other people had to take over this important function for you, like the troops that appeared from nowhere, made a seat with their hands and in turns, carried Fergus as far as Dunkirk where the harbour was chock-a-block with sunken ships. There was something almost biblical about the sight of thousands and thousands of men sitting and lying on the beach in the blazing sunshine and others standing in water up to their necks as they waited to be rescued.

But, fortunately for Fergus, he’d been shot in the leg and it meant a stretcher was called for. He was placed with the wounded, given a drink of water, his boots removed and told he’d be put on the next hospital ship as soon as it arrived. It didn’t matter that his leg was giving him gyp, his destiny was no longer under his control and he was quite happy about it.

 

Ever since the fighting in France had begun, Brenna and Colm had talked well into the night, unable to sleep because all they could think of was Fergus: Fergus being shot, blown up, bayoneted to death, taken prisoner.

‘He was always terrified of his own shadow, poor little lad,’ Brenna sobbed, entirely forgetting that Fergus was now a grown man six inches taller than his mam. ‘I could hardly believe it when he volunteered to fight.’

‘He hasn’t got it in him to fight,’ Colm said soberly. ‘I bet he made a hopeless soldier.’

During the day, Brenna lived by the wireless, waiting for reports of the battle taking place across the Channel, while people kept bringing Colm little snippets of news they’d just come by. ‘Our lads have been cut off at the mouth of the Somme,’ he was told. ‘There’s no escape for them now.’

‘Churchill has ordered the Admiralty to send ships to Dunkirk to rescue the British Expeditionary Force,’ he was told another time.

Over the next few days, Brenna and Colm hardly ate or slept as they waited for news of Fergus, praying that he was still alive, that he had managed to reach Dunkirk where the troops were gathering, that he’d been taken on one of the armada of ships that had been sent to bring them safely home: the naval vessels, the pleasure craft, the fishing boats, the ferries, and the little yachts and motor launches that had volunteered for this mission of mercy.

 

‘Colm!’ Brenna screeched. She flew into the yard to meet him the very second he opened the back door. ‘Oh, Colm!’

‘What’s the matter, luv?’ he asked, going pale.

‘Nancy came round earlier to say our Fergus had phoned. He’s in hospital in Folkestone and he’s hurt his leg, but he’s safe.’ She flung herself into his arms and began to cry. ‘I was convinced he was dead, Colm.’

‘So was I.’ They clung to each other and said a silent prayer that their son was safe. Colm’s face glowed. ‘He’s come through Dunkirk. I never dreamt one day I’d be proud of our Fergus.’

‘He gave Nancy the address of the hospital, so you can write to him, darlin’, tell him how proud we are.’

A few days later, Colm and Brenna had more reason to be proud. A picture appeared in the
Liverpool Echo
of an unrecognizable man face down in a ditch on top of a small boy whose terrified face could just be seen above the man’s shoulder.

‘
Brave Liverpool soldier, Fergus Caffrey, risks his life to save French child from German bullets on way to Dunkirk,
’ proclaimed the caption, and underneath, ‘Just one of the acts of heroism witnessed by photographer, Julian Mellor, who spent two days with the troops as they made their spectacular escape from France.’

Two weeks later, in the middle of June, Fergus arrived home in an ambulance, his leg heavily bandaged, and walking with the aid of crutches. He already felt uncomfortable about the photo in the
Echo
that Mam had sent, but cringed with a mixture of embarrassment and shame when he saw the banner strung across the street with ‘WELCOME HOME, FERGUS’ painted on it. As if on cue, people came pouring out of their houses, surrounding him and shaking his hand, a photographer from the paper took his photo and requested an interview, Mam cried her eyes out and even Dad looked close to tears. His two little nephews, Joey and Mike, went round, busting with self-importance, and telling people, ‘He’s our uncle.’ However, the thing that touched him most was when his brother, Tyrone, squeezed his shoulder and said gruffly, ‘Well done, Ferg,’ because he knew how much Tyrone wanted to be in his shoes and what a much better job he would have made of being a soldier.

 

Colm had given up his job as organizer of the Labour Party - or the job had given up on him, he wasn’t sure. The country was being run by a Government of National Unity: Labour’s Clement Attlee had been appointed Churchill’s deputy and Colm’s all-time hero, Ernest Bevin, was Minister of Labour, so there was no longer any need for members to meet and plot the downfall of the Tories. They were perfectly satisfied with what they had and, consequently, meetings were poorly attended. Added to that, there was no petrol to be had for the van and it had been laid up for the duration.

There being no shortage of work for an able-bodied fellow of forty-six, Colm soon found another job, this time in a munitions factory in Kirkby as a quality control inspector. He retained close links with the local Labour Party and acted as unpaid agent, arranging social events, dealing with the correspondence that had been reduced to a trickle since the war began, and still hosting the monthly meetings in the parlour of the house in Shaw Street that were attended by a handful of party stalwarts.

Six weeks ago, when Ignatius Herlihy, the elderly and ailing Labour Member of Parliament for the seat of Toxteth and Dingle, had passed away quietly in his sleep, it had fallen to Colm to arrange the by-election. His first task had been to circulate members with the news and, after a decent interval for Ignatius Herlihy’s funeral, ask for prospective candidates willing to stand for the vacancy in what was a safe Labour seat. He’d already received an application, sent with indecent haste, from a chap by the name of Bertram Gilbert who worked for Bevin in the Ministry of Labour.

In all, ten applications were received, giving the individual’s personal details, their record in politics and a photograph. Colm had called a special meeting in his parlour so the applications could be discussed and the hopefuls invited to a selection meeting at some future date.

‘There’s four local applicants, four from London, one from the Isle of Wight and one lives in Scotland: Glasgow to be precise,’ he told the assembled crowd of three: Bill Randal, eighty if a day and pedantic to his bones; Jessie Connors, almost as old as Bill and his sworn enemy, automatically disagreeing with everything he said; and Chris Pitt who was about Colm’s age, a sensible chap who only spoke when he had something worth saying.

‘I think we should forget about the ones from the Isle of Wight and Glasgow,’ Bill said. ‘The Government has asked us not to travel if our journey’s not really necessary. It seems unpatriotic to ask people to come so far - it’s unpatriotic of them to apply, come to that,’ he growled. ‘We should scrub that pair out.’

‘Don’t be daft, Bill,’ Jessie said scornfully. ‘If they want to come, we should let ’em. Pass the details around, Colm, there’s a luv. Let’s see what the buggers have to say for thereselves.’

‘One’s from a woman,’ Colm said casually.

‘A woman!’ Chris sounded surprised. ‘I’d like us to send a woman to Parliament. What’s her name, Colm? Is she one of the locals?’

‘She’s called Elizabeth Phelan, she’s forty-two and lives in Wallasey. She’s been a member of the party since she was eighteen, apart from a little break when she joined the Communists.’ Colm was surprised at how steady he managed to keep his voice.

‘The Communists!’ Bill spat. ‘I don’t want to be represented by an ex-Commie.’

‘I remember Lizzie Phelan! She used to be in this branch,’ Jessie cried. ‘Me, I never thought all that much of her, she was much too pleased with herself. Mind you,’ she added hastily, ‘it doesn’t bother me in the least that she was a Communist for a while.’

The arguments raged furiously back and forth between Bill and Jessie, with Chris getting in only the occasional word. Colm hardly spoke at all. In the end, it was decided to invite all four local applicants and two of the London ones to the selection meeting, a decision that took two noisy hours.

Everyone went home, but Colm stayed in the parlour and stared at the photograph of Lizzie Phelan. Unless it was an old one, she’d hardly changed a bit. Her hair was different, curly when it used to be straight - perhaps she’d had it permed. It was an unsuitable photo for the purpose intended, as she was posing like a film star, one shoulder forward and smiling pertly at the camera. He read her neatly typed resumé for the umpteenth time. She hadn’t worked as a secretary for years and had come up in the world since then. For a while, she’d worked for an international agency in Paris, then for the same agency in New York. A matter of weeks before the war began she’d come home and was now living over the water with her sister and working for an engineering company in Chester that produced parts for tanks. Colm smiled. It was just like Lizzie to give up a comfortable, well-paid job abroad and return home to take a job in a factory.

She’d made him feel good about himself, Colm remembered with a touch of nostalgia. She was the one who’d convinced him he had a brain. It was all due to Lizzie that he’d started to read books: George Bernard Shaw, Bertrand Russell, Thomas Paine’s
The Rights of Man
, introducing him to a world he hadn’t known existed. If it weren’t for her, he’d still think himself lucky to have a job like the one in her father’s builders’ yard. Yet their affair, if you could call it such, had been brief and unpleasant and had nearly wrecked his marriage.

The photo was still in his hand when Brenna burst in. ‘Have they gone? I didn’t hear them. D’you want a cup of tea, darlin’?’

‘Please, luv.’ With a feeling of guilt, he shuffled the papers and photos together. ‘I’ve got to write to this lot, tell them whether to come or not, then sort out the selection meeting.’ He hoped there’d be more members there than the three who’d come tonight.

He arranged for the meeting to be held in a room over a pub and turned it into a social event by asking people to bring a few refreshments. Brenna was a member of the party, although she found the meetings boring and never came. Under different circumstances, he would have suggested she attend to swell the numbers, but suspected that, even after all this time, Lizzie Phelan’s name would be like a red rag to a bull, so didn’t mention it and hoped she wouldn’t find out until the matter was over and done with. The odds against Lizzie being selected were virtually nil and she’d disappear out of his life for another twenty years - or perhaps this time it would be for ever.

 

She was by far the best candidate, speaking clearly and concisely, no histrionics or thumping of fists on the table like the male applicants who’d already had their turn - Colm had arranged the speakers alphabetically so Lizzie was next to last. She talked of justice and fairness and her hope for a better world, a world in which women played a bigger part. ‘Especially in Parliament,’ she said. ‘I’m sure you men wouldn’t like it if the governance of the country was almost entirely in the hands of the opposite sex.’