Bia's War (10 page)

“I don’t know whether anyone
else would have accused me, but it was enough for me that that was
how I felt. I know Annie was aware of how my feelings for William
had changed, but she didn’t judge me, so that eased my conscience a
bit and then, as we moved through 1916, everyone’s thoughts turned
to the war, because it was going so badly. When our troops began
fighting on the Somme, the newspapers were full of as much detail
as they were allowed to publish and they were also full of the
lists of the dead. It began to seem that every person in England
had lost someone on the battlefields of France and Flanders. There
were enormous amounts of telegrams sent to households around
Britain, all carrying the terrible news that a son or a father or a
brother had died. Some women wouldn’t answer the door when the
telegraph boy arrived, as though keeping that terrifying piece of
paper out of the house meant that their sons or husbands wouldn’t
be dead.”

“I couldn’t imagine what it must
have been like to learn that your son had been killed on a
battlefield, it tore at my heart to even think about it. There were
nights when I couldn’t leave Simon, even though he was fast asleep
in his little bed, and I would sit holding him tight, praying that
this war would be over before he reached the age to go off and
fight. I wondered how many other mothers, with boys older than
mine, who were whispering that very same prayer as they watched
over their sleeping children, all hoping that the war would end
before it claimed any more lives.”

“It must have been horrendous,
Nana, for all those mothers and sisters and wives and then it
happened again, less than twenty five years later.” Victoria’s eyes
had filled with tears at the thought of so many deaths.

Nana Lymer patted the hand which
had reached out to her as the tears began to fall.

“So much loss and death and
destruction. Could it ever be justified? I often wondered about
that, particularly when we went to war for the second time. I know
many people found solace in religion, but that has never been an
outlet for me and the older I get, the less tolerance I seem to
have for those who put all their hope in a god. But I was telling
you about what it was like at home when our troops were fighting on
the Somme. If I keep on getting side-tracked, I’ll never get to the
end of the story.”

“As I said, the newspapers were
giving out quite a lot of information on what was happening over in
France and many people were beginning to read more into the
official reports than they had done before, going on the numbers of
soldiers who were being killed and seriously injured. There were
also long lists of the missing and convalescing soldiers who were
fit enough to return to their families were letting civilians know
that ‘missing’ often meant blown to pieces, so that no trace
remained.”

“Everywhere that people
gathered, be it on street corners, in public houses or, as in our
case, in shops, the conversations were always about the war; what
was happening and where, who had been killed, who was missing in
action etc. etc. etc. You wouldn’t have thought it was possible for
there to be that many conversations all based on one theme, but
that was how it was. It was an all-consuming passion that ate away
at the lives of everyone left at home, so that all of everyday life
was based on what was happening on the other side of the English
Channel.

“It was during one of these
discussions that Mrs Horner told us that she had heard that the pig
butcher’s only son had been killed, on the second day of action on
the Somme. Until then, I had known so little about Dennison that I
didn’t know that he even had a son, but gossip throughout the rest
of that day soon filled in all the details. Young Albert was not
only the only son, he was also the only child in the Dennison
family, a point which made me grieve even more for his mother,
given that she had no other children to turn to. The reason for
this was revealed when Mrs Horner’s cousin, Mrs Battersby, confided
in the whole shop that Mrs Dennison had fallen with a second child
when Albert was two years old, only to have it beaten out of her
when her husband had been told that his wife was extremely friendly
with the coal man. Not one of the gossips who were discussing this
snippet of information actually believed that the mousy Mrs
Dennison would have attracted the attentions of the tall, handsome
coal-wagon driver. They all firmly believed that Mr Dennison had
picked up the tale when he was drunk and had misunderstood what was
being said. All agreed, however, that the resulting injuries
suffered by Mrs Dennison had put paid to any hopes she may have had
of having further children.”

“Did she go to the police?”
Victoria asked, appalled at the idea of such a brute beating a
pregnant woman.

“People didn’t go to the police
in those days.” Nana explained, “If she had, they would probably
have arrested Dennison, but she would have been too frightened of
him to press charges, worried about what he would have done to her
when he got home. She knew it was safer for her to keep quiet about
it, but she must have suffered both physically and emotionally. I
must admit, I was sickened when I learnt the true character of the
man, but I was so thankful that Hannah wasn’t still working for
him.”

“Over the next few weeks,
Dennison was the subject of much of the gossip in the shop; in fact
his actions often made the subject of the war slip to second place
in people’s minds. He had taken the death of his only child very
badly, his neighbours all spreading the word that he was to be
overheard every night, bellowing about his loss to any who would
listen and that he had taken to regularly frequenting the Red Lion
bar and consuming huge amounts of alcohol. This made him even more
aggressive than he usually was and he began taking it out on his
wife. It soon became unusual to see her without a black eye and
cuts and grazes on her face where he had been using her as a punch
bag, but the worm turned eventually (when he broke her left arm)
and she upped and left him one evening when he was drowning his
sorrows in the Red Lion.”

“He returned home that night to
find his wife gone and to discover that she had taken the contents
of the shop till and his strongbox, leaving him penniless and punch
bag-less. It was said that his rage was terrible to behold, a
statement his neighbour took great delight in expounding on, given
that he had once been on the sharp end of Dennison’s fist when he
had remonstrated with him for hitting his wife. Dennison had taken
his meat cleaver and hacked at the marble meat slab in his shop
until the cleaver had shattered, leaving pits and hollows in the
marble surface.”

“Dennison’s behaviour then
became a problem for us. When he had sobered up, and word on the
street said that that had taken three full days, he realised that
he no longer had a willing slave to provide for his every need,
both in his shop and in his house. What he wanted was his young
servant girl back, so he high-tailed it round to Sammy’s house,
demanding that Hannah return to her rightful employment at once,
which Sam told him would only happen when Hell froze over. Sam
could be quite intimidating in his own way, and because he was
defending his daughter, it didn’t take Dennison long to realise
that he wasn’t going to bully Sam into forcing Hannah to return to
him. But both Sam and I were worried that Dennison might take it
into his head to waylay Hannah on her way to or from the shop and
we both knew that Hannah wouldn’t be able to fight him off. Sam,
because he was working shifts in the iron works, wasn’t often at
home to be able to deliver Hannah to work and then collect her at
the end of the day, so we decided that it would be best if Hannah
stayed with me and didn’t have to walk the streets at all.”

“We both hoped that Dennison
would calm down after a couple of weeks and that things could
return to normal, but we didn’t allow for Dennison’s state of mind.
I truly believe that the man was bordering on insane and that he
should have been committed for the sake of public safety because,
three days after calling at Sam’s house, he called at the
shop.”

“The first we knew of his
arrival was when the shop door was slammed back against the
doorjamb with a force almost strong enough to shatter the door
frame and Dennison entered my shop, screaming that he wanted his
shop-girl back, he wanted her back now and he would flatten anyone
who got in his way.

“Every person in the shop turned
to see who was causing such a commotion, then shrank back against
the shelves to keep out of Dennison’s way. I was in the kitchen
behind the shop, with the door open so that I had a clear view of
what was happening from where I was standing making pastry for the
next batch of pies. My blood ran cold when I saw who it was who was
causing the disturbance, but I breathed a sigh of relief when I
remembered that Hannah was upstairs doing some housework for me.
The only member of staff in the shop at that time was Annie and I
knew she would do all she could to stop Dennison getting through to
the kitchen. I could also tell that the pig butcher hadn’t seen me,
because he was making sure that Hannah wasn’t hiding behind one of
the displays.”

“Making as little noise as
possible, although it was doubtful whether Dennison would have
heard a bomb explode above the noise he was making, I tiptoed
through to the back yard, where Simon and Peter were filling the
cart with the boxes of orders for delivery that afternoon.”

“‘Simon,’ I hissed at him, as
quietly but as forcefully as I could, ‘go upstairs to my bedroom
and you ask Hannah to lock the door so that you are both safe
inside my room. Don’t open it for anyone except me. Do you hear
me?’

“Simon opened his mouth to
question why I was asking him to do something so unusual, but there
was a massive crash from inside the shop and he paled and then ran
as fast as his little legs could carry him, through the kitchen and
up the stairs. I offered up a short prayer that he would do as I
had asked and that Hannah would have heard the noise and guessed
what was going on. Only pausing long enough to check that Simon was
on his way to safety, I then turned to Peter.”

“‘Run to the iron works and ask
the gatekeeper to get Sammy. Tell him Butcher Dennison is on the
rampage and we need him here at the shop. Don’t give up until the
gatekeeper gets Sammy Lymer. Do you understand?’”

“I could have screamed at the
slow way in which Peter absorbed my request. He was wide-eyed and
obviously afraid because of the crashing noises now emanating from
the shop and he stood and stared at me. God forgive me, but in my
panic, I took hold of his arm and shook him like a dog shakes a
rat. It was too much for Peter and he turned his troubled face to
me, his mouth turned down and starting to tremble.”

“’Get to the ironworks and ask
the gatekeeper to get Sammy Lymer. He’s urgently needed at the
shop. Do you hear me, Peter?’”

“And I shook him again, my fear
communicating itself to him. I’d never laid a finger on the lad
until that moment and he was only used to smiles and soft-spoken
requests coming from me. He stared back at me, his pet lip
trembling as he tried in his oh-so-slow way to understand why I was
being so rough with him. I could feel the panic and alarm rising in
my chest as more noise came from the shop and it was at that moment
when the pig butcher appeared in the kitchen, spittle covering his
face and his hair sticking out all round his head. He glanced
around the kitchen, obviously searching for Hannah and me and then
he noticed that the back door was open and he could see Peter and
me standing in the yard.”

“‘Go, Peter, go!!’” I screamed
at him, the time for whispering being past and, thankfully, the
sight of the overweight butcher galvanised Peter into action and he
set off through the open back yard gate, heading for the ironworks.
Dennison made as if to follow Peter, as if he thought Peter would
lead him to Hannah, so I stepped across the yard until I was
standing facing him as he moved out of the kitchen and entered the
backyard. I was only inches from his swinging fists, but I was
overwhelmed by the anger I was feeling at his intrusion of my home
and I stood my ground in front of him, oblivious to the fact that I
should have been scared to death of him. I should have been
cowering away from those massive fists which had already killed his
own unborn child, but my own fury was so white-hot within me that
he should dare to enter my inner sanctum, unbidden, that I threw
caution to the winds.”

“I stood, ramrod-straight and in
total control of every muscle in my body, and stared him straight
in his eye, something which I later learnt that his wife had never
managed to do. I then addressed him as though we had met on our way
into church.”

“‘And what can I do for you, Mr
Dennison?’ I asked, in a very restrained and quiet manner. ‘Do you
need some stores which I can supply or have you come for some of my
famous pies? If so, please come back into the shop and we can serve
you where I serve all my customers’ and I stepped closer to him and
continued to stare straight into his bloodshot eyes. From that
distance, I was very aware that he stank of alcohol, bad breath and
unwashed body and clothes and it took a great deal of resolve not
to shudder and step away from him. I knew, however, that my
attitude was affecting him in a way to which he was clearly unused
and it was in my interests to keep him off balance. It may have
been my quiet tone or the fact that I was so close to him, but
whatever it was, the bluster seemed to go out of him a bit and he
shook himself like a dog before he replied.”

“‘I’ve come for my servant-girl,
Mrs High and Mighty,’ he said when he managed to remember where
he’d left his mouth. ‘You stole her from me and I want her back.
She’s coming with me now, whether you like it or not.’”