Daughters of the Mersey (11 page)

‘We were but Pa made us go out. He said we were making too much noise in the house.’ They’d been playing with the gramophone, another thing Amy wasn’t allowed to do on her own, singing along to it.

Suddenly in the spring of 1939, conscription came and blotted out all their personal problems. Nobody had expected it to come before the war started and it renewed and heightened all their fears. If there was already conscription, who could doubt that war was coming? It took Milo by surprise. He was in the first batch to be called up, and found himself in Aldershot before he had time to think about it.

A few months later, with his basic training behind him, he came home on leave for a weekend. In the middle of Sunday lunch, he said he didn’t like all the square-bashing and would have preferred the merchant navy because he knew a lot about boats.

‘Why didn’t you tell them?’ Mum asked

‘I did,’ he said.

Pa was cross with him. ‘You never stop to think about anything. Didn’t I tell you they’d start on unmarried men without dependents, and it wouldn’t necessarily be the eighteen-year-olds? With a little forethought, you could have made your choice before conscription came in.’

That had made Milo furious. ‘I never wanted to work in your stupid business. I wanted to join the merchant navy when I left school and you stopped me.’

Pa was scathing. ‘I thought I’d mentioned
to you that in the event of war the antiques business would not be considered war work and might not even survive.’

In fact he’d nagged Milo over the last year, but now he held his tardiness up as an example to June because her birthday was just four months away.

‘Once you’re eighteen,’ he’d told her, ‘you’ll probably find yourself directed into uncongenial war work.’

June’s commercial course would finish in July and less had been said recently about her working in the family business.

‘If you’ve any sense, June, you’ll make your job choice now in essential work. Building planes or boats, or manufacturing munitions – they all need secretarial workers.’

Leonie worried about her too but in a different way. Steve had told her several times, ‘You can leave June to me,’ and to a large extent she had. Leonie didn’t doubt for a moment that June was his favourite child, he made it rather too obvious, but June seemed secretive, and though she paid lip service to loving her father as much as he did her, she escaped from his company as often as she could. Leonie was afraid June didn’t want much of her company either, and blamed herself for not giving her more attention as she grew up.

The preparations for war were making Leonie anxious. Gas attacks were expected and gas masks were distributed to all civilians. They were told bombing raids could occur too and public air-raid shelters were being built, but the advice was that householders with space on their own premises should make private arrangements. Every post brought pages of advice about this.

‘I’m not going to a
public shelter,’ Steve said. ‘We have the cellar here, we’ll use that.’

‘Can you get down those steps?’ Leonie asked. ‘They’re quite steep.’

‘I’ve never tried,’ he said sharply. ‘Never had reason to until now. But I can’t walk far and goodness knows where the nearest shelter will be.’

The next day, Leonie went to look at the cellar steps and open the area up. It was years since the cellars had been used. The steps were grimy and made slippery with green algae. Milo would be coming home on another forty-eight-hour pass at the weekend and Leonie decided she’d ask him to help her clean the place up so they could use it.

There was a row of windows that matched those upstairs, but they were only six feet from a retaining wall holding the soil of the garden in place, and they were so begrimed that very little light penetrated into the rooms. She had to get a torch to explore those away from the windows.

She could remember the time when the servants running the house had lived down here, and was surprised to find how extensive the cellars were. In a room that had been used as a kitchen, there was a dripping tap over an ancient stone sink. She had to take a hammer to turn it on, but yes, there was running water down here. There was also a laundry room with more sinks and pulleys for drying clothes, an open fireplace in a living room, but there was no electricity. She found candles and oil lamps that she thought might be useful. The servants’ bedrooms were at the front of the house but below ground level, and clearly that would be the safest place to shelter.

At the weekend, she and the children cleaned the steps and
swept the cellars out. There were four iron bedsteads, some with mattresses filled with straw and some with flock. Together they carried them up to the end of the garden and burned them and carried down others from the house.

Leonie fixed up one room with two beds and made them up for herself and Steve. They might as well have as much comfort as they could during a raid. She put the other two beds in another room for the children to use and thought they could take down an old bed chair for Amy.

For years, all Leonie’s attention had been on her personal problems and they had kept her fully stretched but now quite clearly a greater and more general problem was imminent.

The very thought of war terrified her and at nine o’clock every evening, she and Steve made a point of listening to the latest news bulletin. Tonight as the news ended, Leonie snapped off the wireless and collapsed back on her armchair. War seemed only a breath away.

Steve stirred in the armchair on the other side of the empty grate. She could see the dread on his face. ‘It won’t be long,’ he said, ‘but I won’t be in this one.’

Leonie said, as she had many times to bolster his self-confidence, ‘You’ve done your bit. You fought for your country last time.’

‘And paid for it.’ His voice shook. ‘The war to end wars and it’s only twenty years since . . . It’s Miles and June who will bear the brunt of it this time.’

That was what frightened Leonie most. It would break her heart if Milo ended up like his father.

She felt Amy tug at her skirt. Just to look at her all ready for bed in her flannelette nightdress tugged at her heart too. Amy was growing up; she was now a
pretty nine-year-old with clear skin and straight, light-brown hair that the summer sun had streaked with gold. She had been listening quietly to the news broadcast.

‘Mum, who is this man Hitler? His name is always in the news. Why are you afraid of him?’

Leonie squeezed her hand. Amy would need to understand. ‘He is the German leader, we think he’s about to declare war on us.’

‘But you said war was coming when Milo got called up.’

‘It’s closer now.’

‘Hitler will send his army with guns and tanks to invade us,’ Steve added bitterly.

‘Surely they won’t come here?’ Amy’s blue eyes were wide in horror.

‘We’re afraid they might.’

‘Not necessarily,’ Leonie said quickly.

Steve pulled a wry face. ‘Hitler has fought and overrun other countries, now it looks as though it’s our turn.’

‘There’s no need to fright—’

‘You’ll be all right, Amy,’ Steve said, ‘it’s your brother and sister I’m worried about. A war now is going to catch them at the wrong age.’

Leonie was afraid for Amy too. The child was sitting on a stool near her chair and tugging at her again. ‘But if the Germans are coming here, surely we could all be shot, even me? And they’re going to drop gas on us, aren’t they? That’s why we’ve been given gas masks.’

‘We don’t really know what’s going to happen.’ Leonie shook her head. ‘This war will be different from the last one.’

‘When June took me
to see
Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs
,’ Amy said, ‘we saw a newsreel with German tanks and hundreds of goose-stepping soldiers. They all had their guns on their shoulders.’

‘It’s time you were in bed,’ Steve said abruptly. ‘Come and say goodnight.’

‘I want Mum to—’

‘She’ll come and tuck you in when you’re in bed.’

Slowly and with a great show of reluctance, Amy went. ‘Don’t be long, Mum.’

When the door had closed behind her, Leonie burst out, ‘What are we going to do about her?’

Last week they had received a letter from Amy’s school outlining an evacuation plan and inviting them to a meeting to learn more about it. Leonie had wanted Steve to go with her but he’d said he didn’t feel well enough so she’d gone alone.

‘I thought you’d decided to keep her here with us,’ he said.

Actually, Leonie had signed the form giving permission for Amy to be included in the evacuation, but by the time she’d returned home she couldn’t bear the thought of parting with her. Goodness knows where they’d send her and Leonie didn’t want to have strangers care for her child. What if they weren’t kind to Amy?

‘I wish I knew what to do for the best,’ she said. Steve was no help when it came to making decisions about Amy.

‘It’s up to you, isn’t it?’ he said with cold finality.

All evening Leonie felt under pressure. She knew she had to decide one way or the other and prepare the child for what was coming. She’d heard all the arguments a dozen times. Liverpool was the major port for trading with America, an industrial area
where munitions were being made. The banks of the Mersey would be a dangerous place to live. Almost certainly the Germans would bomb Liverpool. If she wanted to keep Amy safe, she would have to let her go to the country.

Leonie finally drifted off to sleep but at three o’clock that night the silence was shattered by shrill shrieking and yelling that went on and on. She woke with a pounding heart and it took her a while to realise it was Amy who was screaming.

By the time she reached the bedroom Amy shared with her older sister, June had switched the light on and was sitting on Amy’s bed, trying to wrap her arms round the child’s shaking body.

‘I thought the war had started,’ Amy sobbed.

June’s face was flushed with sleep. ‘She’s had a nightmare.’

‘No, Amy, the war hasn’t started,’ Leonie told her. ‘There’s nothing to be scared of.’

‘I saw them, Hitler was in an open car,’ Amy sobbed. ‘And there were tanks and guns and lots of German soldiers marching along the New Chester Road. Everybody was running, trying to get away from them before they got shot.’

‘You’re all right, Amy. Nothing like that is happening,’ June comforted her. ‘It was just a bad dream.’

‘You’re safe at home in your own bed,’ Leonie added. ‘Hitler’s miles away in Germany.’

Steve crowded into the room on his crutches. ‘Now look.’ June hugged her more tightly. ‘You’ve woken up the whole family.’

‘Pa said the Germans were coming.’

‘I said they might come.’ Steve patted her back. ‘But they aren’t here yet so there’s nothing to be frightened of. Settle down now and go back to sleep.’

Amy lifted her tear-stained face and stared round defiantly. ‘Everybody’s
frightened of Hitler. Mum said so. It’s not just me.’

‘Quite,’ Steve said. ‘But it’s the middle of the night and the rest of us need our sleep. Be a good girl and settle down.’

Amy stifled a sob.

‘Bad dreams are horrible things,’ June said soothingly. ‘But they aren’t real. Come on.’ She turned her sister on her side and lay down beside her. ‘I’ll stay in your bed for the rest of the night and hold you close like this.’ She pulled the blankets round them. ‘Are you comfy?’

‘Thank you,’ Leonie mouthed at her older daughter and switched off the light. Steve had not wanted Amy in their bedroom even as a baby. He’d insisted she slept in a room some distance from theirs in case she woke him with her crying. As a toddler Amy had found the large old house spooky, and had said she was scared to sleep in a room by herself. June had been persuaded to let her share hers and now Amy didn’t want to leave although there were other empty rooms.

Back with Steve in their bedroom, Leonie said, ‘Amy would be terrified in an air raid, wouldn’t she?’

‘Panic-stricken.’ He yawned. ‘Better if she was sent off somewhere safe as soon as possible. Otherwise the rest of us will be deprived of sleep.’

H
ALFWAY BETWEEN SLEEP AND
wakefulness, June could feel Ralph’s arms tightening round her and his lips were settling butterfly kisses light as air on her neck. Then his lips were searching for hers and she gave herself up to them.

But it was broad
daylight and it wasn’t Ralph but Amy’s arms that were round her. June daydreamed about Ralph all the time and could think of little else but that he loved her as much as she loved him. He had taken over her life. More awake now, she realised Amy was lying half on top of her and her arms weren’t holding her tight, they were pushing her away.

‘Don’t,’ June groaned. ‘Don’t push. You’ll have me on the floor.’

‘Wake up,’ Amy said. ‘It’s time to get up.’

‘No it isn’t,’ June protested. ‘You woke us all up in the middle of the night.’ Then she sighed, heaved herself up and threw herself across to her own bed.

‘I didn’t mean you to go,’ Amy wailed.

‘There’s not enough room for two.’

‘Don’t go to sleep again.’

June turned away from her. What she wanted was to return to that dreamy state where Ralph Harvey was making love to her.

‘It’s not fair,’ Amy said. ‘I couldn’t help waking you
all up. You can’t blame me for that. Even Pa is frightened of Hitler and it really scared me to see that. Then I dreamed of him riding in a car ahead of a battalion of storm troopers with rifles at the ready. Just like at the pictures.’

‘Shut up,’ June said. ‘Let me go back to sleep.’

Amy sat up and stared at the mound under the eiderdown on the other bed. June was nearly nine years older, slim and graceful with long, curly, honey-blond hair. Pa had told her she was fat because she ate too many sweets while June was the beauty of the family. Mum said she was strong and sturdy and not to worry, that she’d slim down as she grew up.

June’s college course had finished and she’d achieved certificates to prove she had skills in shorthand and typing of an acceptable standard to an employer. Every suppertime now, Pa talked to June about having forethought and making choices. He wanted her to find a suitable a job and settle in before her eighteenth birthday, after which she’d be old enough to be directed into war work.