The Silent War (34 page)

‘Look, Sun,’ said Erin, leaning across the table to her. ‘The guys ’round here are a pretty tough bunch. If that sonoverbitch tries to lay one finger on you, he’ll regret the day he was born. But you’ve got ter tell Gary. For his sake, and for yours too.’

In the background, the dance had come to an end with a burst of rowdy, hooting sounds, jeers, and whistles.

‘Ladies and gentlemen – if you’ll pardon the expression!’

The place again erupted into jeers and whistles as two GIs helped Jinx to stand up on to one of the tables.

‘Unaccustomed as I am to public speaking . . .’

More jeers and whistles as Gary went across to join Sunday and Erin at their table.

‘As it so ’appens, I’ve got something I want to say to my ’usband – yes, and all his gang of thugs here tonight!’

Laughter and applause from everyone this time.

‘I just want to tell you that I’m very proud to be a part of you,’ Jinx said. ‘Thank God this bloody war’s nearly over, and it’s thanks to all of you who’ve made it possible.’ She looked around the sea of faces watching her, and for the first time in her life she felt herself becoming far more serious than she ever thought possible. ‘Believe me, I know what you boys ’ave gone through since you come ’ere to Ridgewell two years ago. I also know what it’s meant to all of you to lose your friends, your buddies, those wonderful people who’ve helped to keep us safe in our beds at night. All I can say from us girls, from
us
Limeys, is – thank you, fellers. When you get ’ome, your folks should be pretty proud of you. I know
I
am.’ Then she turned to Erin. ‘I know I’m proud of you – you ol’ soak!’

This brought a storm of hoots and applause from Erin’s buddies.

At the back of the Mess, Gary was busy using sign language for Sunday, to explain what Jinx had been saying.

‘Hold it right there, Mrs Wendell!’ called Erin, getting up from the table, and winding his way through the party-goers to join his wife. ‘As it so happens,’ he said, ‘I have an important announcement to make.’

This brought a chorus of catcalls and whistles from his buddies.

From the inside of his uniform jacket, Erin took out a piece of official-looking paper, and held it high above his head. ‘See this?’ he called, looking first at the sea of faces watching him, and then up at Jinx. ‘This is official confirmation that in two weeks from now, my wife, Mrs Erin Louis Wendell, will be sailing on the S.S.
Argentina
, bound for the good old U.S. of A.’

This prompted a huge roar of cheers, applause, and whistles from everyone.

Jinx, however, was so shocked, she nearly fell off the table she was still standing on. ‘Erin!’ she gasped. ‘D’you mean it? D’you really mean it?’

Erin climbed up on to a chair at the side of her. ‘Here,’ he said, giving her the official military permit he was holding, ‘take a look for yerself.’

‘She’s goin’ home, folks!’ he called to everyone present. ‘To my home, my folks. An’ lemme tell yer somethin’, huh? When my kid’s born, I want every one of you sonoverbitches to go out and toast him with a tank of Bud!’

‘Him!’ screeched Jinx, excitedly. ‘Who said anything about
him
? If I ’ave anythin’ to do with it, we’re ’avin’ a bloody girl!’

‘Over my dead body!’ growled Erin.

This brought the house down. But just then, one of Erin’s buddies started to sing, ‘Happy Birthday To You’. Soon, the whole Mess Hall was echoing to the rowdy sound of GIs bellowing out in a hell-raising chorus.

At the back of the Mess, Gary threw his arms around Sunday, and hugged her tight. Although it was a celebration that no one could fail to enjoy, at the back of her mind, Sunday still couldn’t forget Ernie Mancroft.

Sunday woke up at about three o’clock in the morning. She wasn’t sure of the exact time, because the wristwatch her mum had given her on her eighteenth birthday had stopped, so during the night she had to rely on her small alarm clock. But something woke her, although she wasn’t quite sure what. It was pitch-dark, so she reached for her torch. After checking the time, she directed the beam around the other beds to make sure everyone was asleep. When she was satisfied that they were, she turned off the torch again, slipped out of bed, and put on her towelling robe and slippers.

She made her way first to the bathroom at the back of the sleeping quarters. Her torch beam scanned the old stone sinks, and the chipped enamel bath itself, where a large house spider had settled down for the night. Everything seemed to be in order, until she suddenly noticed that the outside door had been left slightly ajar. Before closing it, she peered outside. Her torch beam picked up nothing but the shadows of trees bending in a lively gale, which was making it seem far colder than it actually was. Nonetheless, she decided to explore just a little further, so pulling the towelling robe snugly around her neck, she stepped outside. The night clouds were racing across the sky, and every so often the moon managed to make a subliminal appearance, flooding the farmyard with light for no more than a second or so before hurrying back to safety again.

Sunday had no idea why she was being so brave. She
had
often seen girls doing this sort of thing in the pictures, putting themselves at risk as they roamed dangerous places in the middle of the night. But that was what she was doing right then, and like all those girls in the pictures, she was scared out of her life, scared because she could only experience all these strange, distorted images without sound. For her, the silence of the night was far more disturbing than the day. Why, oh why was she connecting this to Ernie Mancroft all the time? Yes, he was a brutal thug all right, but surely he wasn’t the sort who would go around stalking girls just to frighten them? And in any case, what reason had he to frighten her? If he loved her as much as he was always saying, why should he want to harm her? However, no matter how hard she tried, she was unable to convince herself. She turned and hurried back inside the barn. Once she had closed the door, she paused for a moment, suddenly feeling quite stupid to have behaved more like a silly child than an eighteen-year-old.

When she got back to her bed, all the girls were still fast asleep, so she turned off the torch, removed her towelling robe and slippers, and quietly sneaked back under the covers. But as she laid her head back on to the pillow, and turned over to one side, she felt something cold against her cheek. She sat up with a start, reached for her torch, and switched it on.

The torch beam picked out what was lying on her pillow. It was a small snapshot of Ernie Mancroft.

A few days later, there was great excitement in the barn. Not only was Jinx regularly feeling her baby kicking around inside her stomach, but she had also received her tickets for the journey to New York, where Erin’s entire family were planning to meet her at the dockside.

Ever since Erin’s birthday party at the base, Sunday had talked a lot to Jinx about the new life in America that she was about to experience. Despite the caustic way her own mother had reacted to her wedding, Jinx’s loyalties were
divided.
It seemed a crazy thought, but she still loved her mam and dad, and as the time grew closer for her to leave Blighty once and for all, she knew that, like all the other GI brides who were embarking on a strange new journey, she had misgivings.

‘Of course, I’ll come back from time to time,’ said Jinx, as she showed Sunday the new maternity dress Erin had had sent over from the States. ‘After all, whatever she says, my mam’s goin’ ter want ter see this.’ She placed her hand on her stomach and gently rubbed it. ‘Depends ’ow much money Erin’s got in the kitty, I suppose.’

Sunday put her arms around Jinx and held her. ‘Your mum’ll have to get used to it,’ said Sunday. ‘The only things that are important in your life from now on are Erin and your baby.’

‘You’re right,’ replied Jinx, looking up at Sunday. ‘Stupid, in’t it? But I really love Erin, ugly lookin’ goat ’e is.’ Even so, there was a touch of uncertainty on her face. ‘You do like ’im too, don’t you, Sun?’

‘He’s one of the nicest blokes I know,’ replied Sunday. ‘I can’t believe there’s another man in the whole wide world that you could trust more than Erin.’ Sunday had good cause to believe what she had just said, for Erin had been the only person she had told about the snapshot of Ernie Mancroft she had found on her pillow.

‘Thank God they’ve at last finished those bombing raids,’ said Jinx. ‘At least I won’t ’ave to worry about him being missing or killed in action any more. Unless they send ’im out to bomb the Japs in the Far East or somethin’. That’s all I need!’

That same afternoon, Jinx received a call from the CO’s office at the base, asking her to come along to see him. Erin had already warned her to expect this interview, for it was normal procedure for all war brides to be given a friendly but formal lecture before entering the United States. Nonetheless, Jinx was very nervous about the interview, and had to be persuaded not to put on too
much
make-up to meet the CO, just in case he got the wrong impression about her!

‘She’s making a big mistake,’ said Sue, once she was quite sure that Jinx had gone off to her interview. ‘These things never work.’

‘What d’you mean?’ asked Sunday curiously.

‘Well, for a start, Erin’s Jewish.’

Sunday was taken aback. ‘So what?’ she said.

Sue was perched on the edge of her bed, using the mirror of her compact to powder her nose. ‘Jinx was brought up Welsh Chapel. They’ll never accept her in the Hebrew faith.’

‘That’s absolute rubbish!’

Everyone was astonished to hear Sheil contribute to the discussion. It was something she had never done before.

‘It doesn’t matter what faith you belong to,’ said Sheil, making a rare excursion away from squatting on her bed. ‘If you’re a human being, you’ve got the right to love anyone you want.’

‘Romance has got nothing to do with it, Sheil,’ Sue said, in her usual condescending tone. ‘It’s all to do with what you’ve been brought up to believe in.’

‘I was brought up to believe in God,’ replied Sheil, calmly. ‘But He let me down. Now I only believe in me.’

Sunday was impressed with Sheil for saying what she felt, even if she didn’t agree.

Some time later, Sunday went off to see if she could help Ruthie to feed the chickens. But when she got to the chicken runs, Ruthie had already left, so she decided to take a stroll along the public footpath close to the woods where young Ronnie Cloy had often taken her to see the pheasants.

The weather had at last broken, and the sharp, cold spring air had given way to a mild spell that was inducing tufts of grass everywhere to green up in the gradually warming sun. She felt a twinge of excitement as she looked around at the bare branches of the trees, knowing
that
within the next few weeks they would be bursting into life again after their long winter sleep.

When she reached the woods, there seemed to be more pheasants than ever. But then, this was not the time of year to shoot them, despite the fact that once the new crop of wheat had been sown they would undoubtedly ignore the dumb scarecrows that were placed across the fields, and peck up as much seed as they could get their beaks into.

To her astonishment, Sunday noticed that someone was walking through the woods. It seemed an incredible thing for anyone to do, for even though the Civil Defence and USAF engineers had given the all-clear for explosive devices in the area, there was still an outside chance that one or two might remain.

She came to a halt for a moment, and after a while the figure emerged from the woods, and made straight towards her on the footpath. The encounter was making her quite nervous, until she suddenly identified the figure of Arnold Cloy. Unfortunately, there was no way she could avoid him, so she carried on walking in the direction she had started out. A moment or so later, Cloy brought her to a halt again, barring her way. She hadn’t really seen him since Ronnie’s funeral back in March, and thought he was looking much older and more frail. After keeping his eyes lowered to the ground for a brief moment, he raised them again and looked straight at her.

‘You think you know, don’t you?’ he said, his voice strong and firm. ‘You think I didn’t love that boy?’ He walked a few steps towards her, and stopped again. ‘Well, you’re wrong.’

With that, he brushed past, and headed off back towards his bungalow.

When she got back to the barn, Sunday was surprised to see a jeep waiting outside the front door. Recognising it as the one Gary had taken her out in once or twice, she started to run towards it.

Gary was just coming out of the front door when she arrived. She immediately wanted to throw her arms around him and hug him as tight as she could, but the look of anguish on his face told her not to.

‘Jinx is inside,’ he said gravely. ‘She needs you, Sunday.’

Then he sighed. He was close to tears.

‘Erin’s been killed. A collision. Two B17s.’ His voice was cracking with emotion. ‘A goddamn bloody accident.’

The village railway station at Great Yeldham was bathed in warm spring sunshine. It seemed incongruous that the temperature for early April should already be hot enough for people to shed their jackets and pullovers, when just a few weeks before great clumps of ice-hard snow were still obstinately refusing to thaw.

As a small kid, Sunday had always loved railway stations. To her they had always seemed such vast, busy places, with people hurrying from one platform to another to catch their trains, and thick dark smoke billowing up from the funnels of dusty old engines as they puffed out of the station on the way to magical places, like Thorpe Bay. It was only when the war started that she’d realised that railway stations could be tragic places too, the places where families and lovers were parted, with the prospect of never seeing each other again. Although there was nothing vast about Great Yeldham, over the years this tiny village station had also had its share of grief and tears. Throughout the war the modest setting had played host to so many village women and their children who had gathered to wave farewell to their menfolk. Sunday felt a bit like that now as she waited with Jinx on the small sun-drenched platform.