Jenny's War (3 page)

Jenny shook her head.

‘I have,’ Bobby said. ‘Mam packed us some towels.’ He stood up, swaying with the motion of the train.

‘Sit down, boy,’ Mr Napier snapped. ‘I don’t want you falling and breaking a limb. I’ll get it. Which one’s yours?’

Bobby pointed to the luggage rack. ‘The blue one, sir.’

Mr Napier reached up to the rack, his hand already on the bag when Jenny spewed up her breakfast. Vomit splashed on to the floor of the carriage.

‘Ugh!’ the other children in the carriage cried in disgust. ‘You dirty little devil.’

Mr Napier looked down at his trousers and sighed. His left leg was stained and the smell now permeating the carriage made everyone feel ill.

‘Open the window, Harrington,’ he said, motioning to Billy, who was sitting near the window.

Jenny hung her head, embarrassed and angry with herself. She’d so enjoyed Arthur’s breakfast and now she’d lost it and there was a horrible taste left in her mouth too. ‘I’m sorry, sir,’ she whispered.

‘Your mother should have known better than to let you eat so much just before a long journey.’

Surreptitiously, Bobby squeezed her hand. ‘It’s not your fault. We’ll use my towel to mop it up.’

Sammy stood up and helped Mr Napier lower the heavy bag from the rack. ‘I’ll see to it, sir,’ he said, winking at Jenny. ‘No harm done, eh?’

‘I don’t know about that,’ the teacher muttered, glancing down again at his soiled trouser leg.

Sammy bent and wiped away the offending liquid with an old towel he’d pulled from Bobby’s bag. Then he mopped the floor as best he could. Lastly, he rolled the towel up into a ball and shoved it under the seat. As he sat back in his seat, the boy sitting beside him muttered. ‘You stink, Sammy Hutton.’

But Sammy only grinned. ‘No more than you do all the time, Bates. At least I wash every day and have a bath once a week, which is more than—’

‘Now, now, boys,’ Mr Napier remonstrated, but with little anger. He was grateful to Sammy for taking charge of the unpleasant situation. He’d noticed that the Hutton boys were taking care of the young girl. He didn’t know Jenny – she wasn’t in his class – but he knew Sammy well as a kind and helpful lad.

The rest of the journey passed off uneventfully, though several of the children held their hands over their mouths and noses and cast accusing glances at Jenny, but Mr Napier noticed Billy wink and smile at the girl to reassure her. The train stopped at two or three stations, but each time Mr Napier shook his head to the children’s questions, ‘Are we there?’ ‘Is this it?’

At last, as the train began to slow yet again, Mr Napier peered out of the carriage window and announced, ‘This is where we get off. At least—’ The flurry of excitement as the children tumbled thankfully on to the platform drowned the rest of his sentence.

‘Come on, Jen,’ Sammy said, getting up and pulling her case down from the rack.

‘What about my towel, Sammy?’ Bobby asked.

‘Leave it. It was only an old one anyway. Come on, get a move on. We don’t want to be left on the train. We don’t know where we might end up.’

‘We don’t know now,’ Bobby muttered, but he grabbed hold of Jenny’s case and leapt off the train, then held out his hand to help her.

She scrambled after him and stood on the draughty platform looking about her and shivering even in the warm September sun. Some of the other children were standing about looking as lost and bewildered as Jenny was feeling, but others ran up and down the platform, shouting and laughing as if they were on holiday. Perhaps they felt as if they were. Removed from the control of their parents and put in the charge of a few teachers who could hardly cope with the number of children in such unusual circumstances, a few were running wild, Billy amongst them.

A whistle shrilled and everyone stopped as if turned to stone. The children looked about them, wide-eyed and fearful. A big man in railway uniform stood halfway up a flight of steps. ‘Stop running about,’ he boomed in a voice that carried the length of the platform. ‘There’re trains coming and someone’ll get hurt. Now, line up properly for your teachers and behave yourselves.’

No amount of shouting and gesticulating from the teachers could have achieved the same result. The children meekly formed themselves into groups around the teacher who had been put in charge of them. Jenny, clinging unashamedly now to Bobby, joined the group around Mr Napier. Catching sight of her, he said, ‘You, girl, whatever your name is—’

‘It’s Jenny Mercer, sir,’ Bobby piped up.

‘Yes, yes, Jenny – you’re to go to your own teacher’s group. Miss Chisholm, isn’t it? She’s over there.’

Jenny began to move towards her own class teacher, dragging Bobby along with her.

‘No, Hutton,’ Mr Napier ordered. ‘You stay here. I know you’re in Miss Chisholm’s class, but we have instructions that families are to be kept together wherever possible. You stay in my group with your brother.’

Bobby looked at Jenny apologetically and tried to release his hand from her grasp, but she clung on all the more tightly. ‘No,’ she cried. ‘I want to stay with Bobby – and Sammy. Why can’t I come with you?’

‘Because—’ the flustered man began. This was all too much. He’d entered the profession to teach not to nursemaid a bunch of uncontrollable children, who were treating the serious matter of being evacuated from danger as if it were a day’s outing to the seaside.

Jenny’s voice rose in protest. ‘I want to stay with Bobby.’

‘You’re coming with me, young lady.’ Miss Chisholm’s firm grasp fastened on Jenny’s arm and hauled her away. The girl began to scream, but the middle-aged woman was well used to dealing with the likes of Jenny Mercer – and even with Jenny herself during the time she’d been her teacher.

Mr Napier stood looking on helplessly, whilst Bobby and Sammy attempted to follow Miss Chisholm to plead Jenny’s case.

‘Hutton – stay here, if you please.’ Sammy, used to obeying the man, stopped at once, but Bobby went on.

‘Bobby, mate, it’s no use,’ his brother called after him. ‘There’s nothin’ we can do. They’re in charge of us. Let her go.’

The last sight Bobby had of Jenny was of her being dragged away with tears pouring down her face. The sound of her cries echoing in his ears would haunt his dreams for several nights.

Now they were put on different trains. Jenny, still crying loudly but held fast by Miss Chisholm, was forced to watch her friends get back on to the train they had just left. Jenny’s teacher and a colleague were left standing on the platform with the children from their classes.

‘We’ve to catch a connection to take us to where we’re going. It won’t be long,’ Miss Chisholm said, more gently now. She was a strict teacher and held her class in fear of her, yet beneath the stern exterior there was sympathy for those less fortunate children in her charge. And Jenny Mercer was one of them. She knew a little of the girl’s home life; had to deal with the child’s dirty appearance on a regular basis, and at this moment felt pity for the little girl who was being separated from the two boys who lived next door to her home and were her friends. Jenny didn’t make friends easily and her classmates avoided her. There was often a scuffle in the classroom by the children wanting to avoid sitting next to her. Only Bobby never seemed to mind. Although he was a year older than Jenny, he was still in the same class and Miss Chisholm had found herself allowing him to sit near her, even though it was normal for girls to be on one side of the room, the boys on the other.

But now they’d been separated; they weren’t even going to the same destination. Goodness only knew when they would see each other again. And meanwhile, poor Jenny was thrust amongst the rest of her classmates, who flatly refused to befriend her.

‘I’m not sitting near “Sicky”,’ the teacher heard one girl mutter as she shepherded them onto the train.

‘Don’t call her that.’ Billy, who was also now once more under Miss Chisholm’s authority, pushed the girl roughly. ‘It could’ve ’appened to any of us.’

The girl flushed but still turned her back on Jenny.

‘You sit with me,’ Miss Chisholm said softly. ‘I shall be staying for a day or two until you’re all settled. So come along, dry those tears and we’ll find you someone nice to stay with.’

‘I want to go with Bobby,’ Jenny wailed one last time, even though, as she watched the train carrying her friend move out of the station, she knew it was hopeless.

‘I know, I know,’ Miss Chisholm said, surprisingly kindly. ‘But it’ll be all right, I promise.’

But even the powerful Miss Chisholm, who ruled her class with a rod of iron – or rather a wooden cane, if necessary – was no match for the billeting officers with their badge of governmental authority.

They hadn’t been on the train many minutes, it seemed to Jenny, before it shuddered to a stop and the guard walked down the down the platform shouting, ‘Ravensfleet, Ravensfleet. Next stop Lynthorpe.’

Miss Chisholm was suddenly galvanized into action. ‘This is it. This is our stop. Hurry, children, collect your belongings. I must tell them in the next carriage.’ She lifted her own suitcase down from the rack and opened the door.

‘Don’t leave us!’ Jenny screamed.

‘It’s all right, I’m just here on the platform. I’m not far away.’

Seeing that the school parties were alighting, the guard came to help and lifted the smaller children down.

‘Where’s Miss Jones?’ Jenny heard Miss Chisholm ask. ‘My colleague?’

The guard pointed. ‘Two carriages further along, miss. Now, come along, you lot. Get back from the edge of the platform, there’s good kids.’

‘Doesn’t he talk funny,’ one boy said.

Jenny stood feeling lost and lonely. She shivered again. The afternoon sun was dropping low in the sky and there was a chill in the air on the draughty platform. And there was something else too. The air smelt funny. Sort of salty.

Miss Chisholm hurried back to the children standing huddled together. ‘Miss Jones and her party are going on to Lynthorpe, but this is our stop. Now—’ she looked around her – ‘I wonder who’s here to meet us.’

As if on cue, a small, thin man, with a receding hairline and wearing spectacles, came hurrying along the platform towards them.

‘You must be the party from London.’ He held out his hand to Miss Chisholm. ‘I’m Mr Tomkins, the billeting officer for Ravensfleet. Now, come along, we have refreshments waiting for you in the school. Of course, it’s still closed for the summer holidays at the moment so you’ll be bedded down there for the night. And then in the morning we’ll start getting you all sorted out.’ He beamed round at the children. ‘Welcome to Ravensfleet. I hope you’ll be happy with us. We’re all anxious to make you feel at home.’

Twenty-three solemn little faces with mistrustful eyes stared back at him. He cleared his throat nervously. ‘Come along, then. Follow me.’

They trooped after him out of the station and along the street walking two by two, though Jenny still walked beside Miss Chisholm. Along the narrow street, through a market square and round another corner until they came to a school building.

‘Here we are,’ Mr Tomkins said cheerfully. ‘Come along in. The good ladies of the town have got a meal ready for you.’

The children trooped into a large classroom where trestle tables had been set with knives, forks and spoons. Several women at one end of the room ceased their chatter and turned to stare at the newcomers. One rotund woman came towards them with a beaming smile. ‘Now then, my little loves, you come and sit yarsens down and we’ll get you summat to eat.’

The children shuffled uneasily and stared at her, but said nothing. They weren’t exactly sure what the woman had said. Her way of speaking was so very different to their own.

‘That would be most welcome,’ Miss Chisholm said politely. ‘Thank you.’

‘Dorn’t mention it, duck. We’ve all got to do our bit till this lot’s over. Sit ya down.’

Within minutes, enamel bowls of mashed potato and vegetables with a little meat had been placed in front of each child.’

‘What, no chips?’ Billy said.

‘Now, Billy,’ Miss Chisholm remonstrated gently. She knew the boy’s diet consisted mainly of chips from the local shop. She doubted he ever had a proper meal. ‘Just try it, there’s a good boy.’

She smiled at him, knowing that if Billy would lead the way the other children would follow. She glanced at Jenny beside her. The child, though still with a tear-streaked, grubby face, had lifted her fork and was trying the food in front of her. She chewed it and then nodded across the table at Billy. ‘It’s nice, Billy. Give it a try.’

Billy Harrington wrinkled his nose but did as she suggested. After a moment, he, too, nodded. ‘’S’all right, is this. Ta very much, missis.’

The large lady, who seemed to be in charge of the others, laughed and nodded, her several chins wobbling. ‘Ya welcome, duck, I’m sure.’

When they’d finished eating, Mr Tomkins stood at the end of the room. ‘It’s too late now to get you to your billets, so your foster parents will come for you in the morning. You’ll stay here tonight. We have mattresses and blankets for you to sleep on the floor and Mrs Clark’ – he gestured towards the large friendly woman – ‘is the caretaker at this school. She’ll show you where the toilets and washbasins are. Perhaps’ – he looked towards Miss Chisholm for her help – ‘some of the older boys would help Mrs Clark move the trestle tables out of the way. Then in the morning . . .’

His words were lost as Billy leapt up from his seat and began directing his classmates to move the forms they’d been sitting on and to fold up the tables. There was a lot of noise – chatter and scraping of furniture – but soon Mrs Clark, still beaming, led them to the next room where there was a pile of straw mattresses and grey blankets.

‘The girls will sleep in here and the boys in the other room. Now, lads, tek a mattress and a blanket each.’

It took an hour or more before the children began to settle down, tiredness and the emotion of the day catching up with them. Jenny lay on the scratchy straw palliasse, snuggling beneath the coarse blanket and clutching Bert tightly. She lay there listening to the sounds of the other sleeping children and her heavy eyelids began to close. It had been a long and traumatic day for all of them, but for no one more so than Jenny, who’d not only left the only home she knew, but also had been dragged away from her friend. ‘I wonder where Bobby is now’ was her last thought as she fell into a troubled sleep.