The Girl With No Name (30 page)

‘I thought we’d use this room over Christmas,’ Miss Edie said. ‘My father always put the roses up in here.’ She fetched the steps and Charlotte held one end of the chain while she attached the other to the wall.

‘Now we’re ready for Christmas,’ Miss Edie said when they’d finished. ‘It all looks very cheerful, doesn’t it? We’ll light the fire in here tomorrow.’

Christmas Day dawned dry and cold. Miss Edie and Charlotte exchanged presents at breakfast. Edie was charmed and delighted with her cushion cover. She’d had no idea that Charlotte was making it, but she could see the immense care and effort that had gone into it. Charlotte had known about the blue cardigan, but she was pleased to wear it with her new navy winter dress that they had adapted from one found in the attic suitcase, adding her blue beads as a finishing touch. The atlas and dictionary were a complete surprise and she was thrilled with them.

‘Thank you, Miss Edie, I love them,’ she cried and to the surprise of both of them, she gave her foster mother a hug. ‘We should put the dictionary on the kitchen mantelpiece,’ she said. ‘That’s where it’s always kept.’

Edie noticed another jigsaw piece of Charlotte’s memory, though this time Charlotte, in her delight with her Christmas presents, hadn’t noticed what she’d said.

At Miss Edie’s suggestion she had hemmed two more hankies cut from an old sheet, and embroidered the initials AS and DS in the corner to give the vicar and Mrs Vicar as Christmas gifts. Sitting by the fire in the newly cleaned sitting room on the Sunday evening, she had worked Avril’s in pink and David’s in blue and as before, Edie was impressed with her skill. These were now wrapped in paper, decorated by Charlotte and tied with coloured thread, ready for when they went to the vicarage for lunch.

Just before eleven Miss Edie asked, ‘Would you like to go to the service in church, Charlotte?’

Charlotte looked doubtful. ‘I don’t know,’ she said. ‘I shan’t know what to do.’

‘It’ll be lovely,’ Miss Edie assured her. ‘Candles and singing. We can just sit at the back and you’ll see what happens.’

‘All right,’ Charlotte agreed and they walked down into the village. There were no bells ringing, there had been no bells since the outbreak of war – but as they approached, it seemed that the entire village was heading towards the church. Charlotte saw Clare walking with the Prynnes and ran to catch up with her.

‘Happy Christmas!’ Clare cried when she saw her. ‘You coming to church, too? Sandra’s singing a carol with the other school kids. What did you get for Christmas?’

‘An atlas and a dictionary,’ Charlotte told her proudly, quite forgetting the painstakingly knitted blue cardigan she was wearing. ‘What about you?’

‘They’ve done up Ma’s old bike for me!’ Clare beamed. ‘Means I can bike anywhere I want to now.’

‘Ooh, lucky you!’ Charlotte said enviously.

They arrived at the church door and there was the vicar welcoming them inside. Clare and the Prynnes went in together, but Charlotte hung back, wanting to go in last and sit at the back where no one could see her. She and Miss Edie waited until the vicar had gone in himself and then slipped into the back pew.

Miss Edie had surprised herself when she’d suggested that they go to the service. She hadn’t been to church for years, but having got back into the spirit of Christmas, she felt that the village service on Christmas morning was part of it all. When the service started with ‘O Come, All Ye Faithful’ she lifted her head and sang as she used to. Charlotte didn’t know the words, but they were supplied in the hymn book that Miss Edie had handed her as they’d gone in and she, too, sang.

When the service was over the vicar stood at the door and shook hands with everyone as they came out. As their turn came, he showed no surprise at seeing Charlotte and Miss Edie among his congregation, simply saying, ‘Lovely to see you both. Merry Christmas.’

It was a cold day, but everyone stood about outside again, talking, laughing and exchanging Christmas greetings. Charlotte was surprised at how many people smiled at her and wished her ‘Merry Christmas!’ For the first time she felt that she was really part of Wynsdown and she returned their smiles. Even Tommy Gurney saying, ‘Happy Christmas, vaccie,’ didn’t dampen her day.

When they arrived at the vicarage for lunch, David and Avril made them very welcome, David saying again how lovely it had been to see them at church. Miss Edie had brought a bottle of her home-made elderflower wine and Charlotte had her parcel of hankies.

‘We’re having presents after lunch,’ said Avril, shooing the children away from the kitchen and into the drawing room, warm for the first time since Christmas the year before. There was a tree in the corner and underneath it were Christmas gifts, wrapped, waiting to be opened. Charlotte placed her parcels there and Miss Edie added her bottle of wine.

Christmas lunch was delicious; the chicken and roast potatoes disappeared like magic and the Christmas pudding, though short on dried fruit, yielded, to the delight of the four children, a threepenny bit for each of them. After the meal they all gathered in the drawing room and listened to the king speaking on the radio. He said it was, above all, a children’s day and he was sure that everyone was doing their best to make it a happy one wherever those children were.

‘He knows we ain’t at home,’ Paul said, marvelling at the king’s prescience. ‘How does he know that?’

When the speech was over they gave and received their presents. There was a toy for each of the Dawson children, a book about animals for Charlotte, a tiny bar of perfumed soap for Miss Edie, and an extra twist of coloured paper full of sweets for the children.

Charlotte presented her presents to the vicar and his wife and they were both delighted with their embroidered handkerchiefs.

‘They’re beautifully done, Charlotte,’ said Avril as she admired the needlework. ‘They must have taken you ages.’

‘Not as long as Miss Edie took to make my cardigan,’ Charlotte said, holding out her arms to show it off. ‘She took an old one apart and made me this.’

‘It’s lovely,’ said Avril, adding, as she noticed Charlotte’s necklace, ‘and your necklace matches it perfectly.’

‘Harry gave it to me,’ Charlotte said.

‘Harry? Who’s Harry?’ asked Avril gently.

Charlotte looked at her for a moment and then said, ‘He comes from my town. He comes from Hanau.’

Harry spent his Christmas in an internment camp on the Isle of Man. When he’d been arrested at the hostel he was taken to the local police station and put into a cell. He was searched and the money that he’d stashed in his pocket was removed and put in an envelope.

‘Hey!’ he cried, trying to grab it back. ‘That’s mine. That’s my money. Give it back! Give it back!’

‘It’s all right, son,’ the policeman said to him placatingly. ‘It’s still your money, look, it’s in an envelope with your name on it, see?’

They’d taken his ID card, which was in the name of Heinrich Schwarz, and put it with all the documents Mr Pate had given them into a folder labelled
Heinrich Schwarz
, and his money was put into it as well.

‘I need the toilet,’ he said as they took him to the cells, hoping that he’d be taken to a lavatory and might be able to make a dash for it before he was locked up. The constable kept a firm grip on his arm. ‘Sorry, mate,’ he said and pushed Harry into the cell. It was furnished with a narrow wooden shelf for a bed, with blanket and pillow. A bucket stood in a corner. The constable pointed to the bucket and said, ‘You need a piss? You can piss in that.’

When the door clanged shut behind him, Harry looked round him, wondering if there was any way of escape. High above him was a window crossed with vertical iron bars. No way out through that. He reached for the bars and managed to haul himself up, scrabbling for purchase with his toes, until he could see out through the grubby panes. The window faced into a yard, surrounded by a high wall. A double gate stood open at one end and there were two police cars parked below.

Before it got dark he was given a plate of fish with some soggy chips, and then warning him that everything had to be blacked out, they switched off the lights. It was only early evening and as Harry sat in the darkened cell, he could hear the world going on outside without him. As the moon rose and he could make out shapes within the cell, the sirens began their nightly wail. Almost immediately he could hear the aircraft overhead and the pounding of the anti-aircraft guns in a nearby street. Suddenly he heard the sound of a key in the door and a voice said, ‘All right, Schwarz! We’re coming in to take you down to the shelter. Any nonsense from you and you’ll be back in handcuffs.’ The door opened and two burly policemen came in, one with a torch. Harry allowed himself to be led from the cell and down into the basement of the station, which had been fitted out as an air raid shelter. There was a table and a couple of chairs, but nowhere to lie down. He was told to sit and he flopped down on to a chair in a corner. He appeared to be the only prisoner and he sat there, accompanied by one of the police officers, to wait the raid out. For a brief moment, as they had gone along the passage to the basement steps, Harry had considered trying to make a break for it, but common sense prevailed; he would never have made it to the front door of the police station, and even if he had, he’d have been on the streets in what sounded like the father and mother of a raid. They could hear the continual clamour of the Blitz outside, the drone of planes, the boom of the ack-ack, the howl and whistle of the bombs before the ground shuddered under their impact and explosion. Fire engines, their bells clanging, hurtled through the streets to douse fires before they spread beyond control. It was mayhem.

‘Sounds like a bad ’un,’ said the constable. ‘We’re better off down here, mate.’

Though he had hoped to be back with Dan, firefighting, Harry had to agree with him. Casualties in a raid like this would be enormous; he was better off where he was. However, as the constable seemed ready to talk, Harry thought he’d try and discover what was going to happen to him.

‘Why am I here?’ he asked. ‘I ain’t no enemy alien. I escape from Nazis in Germany. On the train.’

‘Yeah, well, you’re still German though, ain’t you?’

‘Not all Germans Nazis,’ Harry said.

‘Trouble is, we don’t know which of you is an’ which ain’t.’

‘My family Jewish,’ Harry told him. ‘Nazis kill my father and mother. I hate Nazis.’

‘I’m sure you do, mate. Still, you’re a German, see, an’ your papers say you’re sixteen, so...’ He raised his hands dismissively.

‘So, what going to happen to me?’

‘Dunno.’ The constable clearly didn’t care. ‘You’ll probably go up north or somewheres first, then, well who knows? Some of you lot’ve been sent to Canada or Australia where you can’t do no harm. ’Spect you’ll be looked after, put somewhere safe and at the end of the war you’ll be let go.’

Harry stared at him. ‘Till the end of the war? Suppose the Nazis win?’ he said. ‘What happen to
me
then?’

The policeman gave him a hostile stare. ‘Who gives a fuck? They ain’t gonna win,’ he snarled. ‘Now, shut your face.’

It was another hour and a half before the all-clear sounded and Harry was led back to his cell. The constable had said not another word to him. They’d sat in stony silence waiting for the all-clear.

Back in the cell with the blackout still in force, Harry could see very little. He hauled himself up on the bars of his window again and peered out. The whole sky was lit with a lurid orange glow, smoke wafting lazily in the wind. The Luftwaffe had done its job and swathes of London were ablaze once more. He could hear the continual ringing of fire engine bells as the firefighters raced from one blaze to another. Men shouted and there was the occasional rumble of falling masonry, the occasional boom of a delayed-action bomb. Day dawned outside and a few fingers of sunlight forced their way through the dirty panes of his window, but still no one came near him and he had to make use of his bucket. He was very thirsty, but no one brought water and no food was offered. The watch he’d bought from one of Mikey’s stalls had been taken with his other personal possessions and he had no idea of the time, but eventually he heard heavy footsteps approaching his door and the constable who had escorted him to the cell the day before appeared.

‘Let’s ’ave you,’ he said by way of greeting.

‘Water, want water,’ Harry said, his voice croaky in his dry throat.

‘You’ll get some soon enough,’ replied the constable and led him along the passage to an interview room where another officer was already waiting.

‘Here he is, Dawes,’ said the constable. ‘The inspector’ll be along directly.’ He turned to Harry, still standing just inside the room, and pointed to a chair. ‘You, sit down there and wait.’

Harry sat as he was told and waited. Dawes, the officer left with him, took no notice of him, simply stood with his back to the door apparently staring into space. After about half an hour Harry got to his feet and stretched. Dawes still ignored him, so Harry went across to the window and looked out. The day outside was sunny and bright. He could see little beyond the high wall he’d seen from his cell, a tall building opposite, the tops of a few trees, their leaves burnished orange, red and gold in the autumn sunlight, and in the distance a church steeple, its crowning cross leaning at a drunken angle.

Harry went back to his chair and flopped down to wait. ‘I want water,’ he said to the man on the door. ‘Please, I want water.’

Dawes continued to ignore him. He’d been talking to Constable Brown from the night shift who had guarded this man during the air raid and Brown had told him that this prisoner was a Nazi who wanted Germany to win the war. Thirsty, was he? Well, he could die of thirst for all Dawes cared.

At last the door opened and another man came in. He was not wearing uniform, but he was clearly Dawes’s superior officer as the man came to attention. Harry remained seated and the plain-clothes officer took the chair opposite him.

‘Now then, young man,’ he began, ‘I’m Inspector Gordon. Can you understand what I’m saying to you?’