The Silent War (50 page)

‘Come on, Sun! It’s gettin’ late!’ Alby, the eldest, was already pulling at Sunday’s hand. ‘We wanna show yer all the presents we’ve got.’

Sunday took a quick glance at the clock on the mantelpiece. It wasn’t even half past seven.

‘Farver Chris’mass brought me a smashin’ machine-gun!’ squealed a delirious Josie, the youngest.

‘A machine-gun!’ spluttered Sunday, astonished. ‘That’s not a girl’s present,’ she said, having in mind the child’s pastry-set she had waiting for Josie under her own small Christmas tree.

‘She’s not a gel,’ sneered Alby. ‘She’s a moron!’

‘No I’m not! No I’m not!’ Josie started pummelling her big brother.

It was too early in the morning for Sunday to have to cope with all this high excitement. But at least it took her mind off waking up in the flat alone for the first time ever on a Christmas Day.

‘What about you, Barry?’ Sunday asked, once she had separated Josie and her elder brother.

Barry, who was seven, was the studious one, and he held out a book he had got for Christmas.

Sunday took the book and looked at the title:
How It Works And How It’s Done
. She looked baffled. ‘What’s it all about?’ she asked.

Barry shrugged his shoulders. ‘Makin’ fings,’ he replied.

It took her ages to get rid of the kids, for Josie and Alby kept taking crafty looks at the small parcels under Sunday’s tree, just in case any of the labels had their names on them. Once she was finally left on her own again, she started to get herself organised. Although she had been invited to spend Christmas Day with the Mooney family, she had a few things she had to do first, like getting dressed, having some breakfast, and finishing writing the labels on some of those parcels which so intrigued little Josie and her big brother!

Whilst she was bustling around, she listened to the wireless. For Sunday, this was a magical treat, and one of the best Christmas presents she would ever have. To be able to hear early-morning carols, the traditional ‘Postman’s Knock’ programme, and one record request after another of popular songs in ‘Forces Favourites’ was something which, only a few weeks before, she had thought she would never experience again. Sunday repaid this wonderfully restored gift by making an effort to keep the spirit of Christmas alive. Even though she was now living alone, she had decorated the flat with paper chains, written Christmas cards to Aunt Louie, Jinx and Junior, and friends and neighbours in ‘the Buildings’, and answered the cards she had received from her old mates at Cloy’s Farm. She had also bought a small Christmas tree from Hicks the Greengrocers in Seven Sisters Road, and crammed the mantelpiece with all the Christmas cards that people had sent to her. It seemed right that she shouldn’t turn her back on the important things of life just because she was living alone. Making an effort was what her mum would have wished.

The Mooneys’ flat looked like a fairground. The entire place was draped with paper chains and lanterns made by the kids, Christmas cards were dangling from lines of string suspended from one wall to another, and a huge green Christmas tree bulging with pre-war coloured fairy lights was wedged into a corner of the parlour, making it difficult to get into Doll and Joe’s bedroom. There were Alby’s gawky, coloured pictures of Father Christmas pinned all along the mantelpiece, mistletoe and holly above every door in the flat, and a plethora of austere-looking toys scattered all over the floor.

When Sunday arrived, she couldn’t believe her eyes. When she’d eventually managed to get through the parlour door, step over the second-hand train set Seamus had got for Christmas, and been dragged off by Josie into the kids’ bedroom to be shot at by her machine-gun, she was grateful to be able to reach the sanity of the small kitchen, where Doll was attempting to baste a fair-sized turkey before returning it to the oven.

‘Who was it said Chris’mass is a time fer rejoicin’?’ she complained, face streaked with sweat, and strands of hair from her upswept hair-do dangling down into her eyes. ‘This is more like slave bleedin’ labour!’

Sunday offered to help, but Doll insisted that she go and get ‘that lazy sod of an ’usband of mine’ to get her a drink.

In the parlour, Joe was quite oblivious of all the pandemonium that was going on around him. He just sat in his usual chair by the fireplace, reading the sports pages of a three-day-old copy of the
Daily Mirror
, surrounded by his kids who were yelling their heads off in a fierce battle of ‘Snakes and Ladders’. Finally, however, even he had enough. ‘Seamus!’ he snapped. ‘Will yer stop that screechin’. You’re not a bloody gel, yer know! Now be takin’ you lot ter yer own room. This is the good Lord’s birthday, and He needs a bit of peace an’ quiet!’

Groaning and moaning, the kids were banished to their bedroom.

‘Sorry about that, Sunday,’ said Joe, draining the last drops of Guinness from his pint glass. ‘Why in the world did we have ter have all these kids?’

Sunday wanted to tell him, but she thought better of it. ‘I think you’ve got a lovely family, Joe,’ she replied pointedly. ‘I envy you.’

‘Yes, well yer can have this lot any time you’re passin’!’ he said. ‘I tell yer, if yer lived here, you’d be better off the way yer were – deaf!’

Sunday thought that a pretty unsavoury remark, but as she was perfectly aware that Joe Mooney was not the most tactful man in the world, she ignored it. And when he went back to reading his newspaper again, she knew there wasn’t much chance of getting a drink, so she wandered aimlessly around the room casually looking at the Christmas cards and peering out the window at the dull grey Christmas Day weather.

‘You know, we’re very lucky, aren’t we?’ she said, without turning.

Joe looked up from his newspaper. ‘What was that yer said?’

Sunday turned. ‘I said, we’re very lucky – to have a roof over our head. When you think of the number of people who lost their homes during the war.’

Joe shrugged his shoulders. ‘It shouldn’ve happened,’ he replied. ‘That’s the trouble with you British. Yer’ve always got a nose for a fight.’

Sunday stiffened. ‘You’re not blaming us for the war, are you, Joe?’ she said indignantly. ‘We didn’t start it, you know.’

‘No. But it could’ve been avoided.’ He turned around to look over his shoulder at her. ‘I ask yer – what was it all about? It was about land, the taking of land that doesn’t belong to yer. Just like what happened back home in Ireland. Mark my words, that’ll all flare up again one of these days.’ He turned back to his newspaper again. ‘No.
If
yer ask me people are too selfish. They want everythin’ their own way.’

Sunday thought that a bit rich coming from someone who treated his wife and family with the utmost contempt. She was bursting to ask him if he thought it selfish to go off night after night to shack up with another woman whilst his own wife had to struggle to bring up five kids? And she was dying to ask him which one it was in this household who had everything their own way. ‘Any news yet, Joe?’ she asked, feeling it wiser to change the subject. ‘About when you’re all going to move?’

Joe suddenly slammed down his newspaper, and darted a glance at her. ‘What’s that yer say? Who told you that?’

Sunday looked surprised. ‘I thought it was common knowledge.’

Joe immediately got up from his chair. ‘Well, it’s not. Not yet.’

‘So you’re not going to take this job – at the car firm in Dagenham?’

Joe went across to her. ‘Look, Sunday. I don’t know what that woman’s been tellin’ yer, but
I
make the decisions in this house, not her!’ At that moment, he realised that he might be overreacting. ‘So what’s so special if we do decide ter move out? This is a block of flats. People come an’ go all the time.’ Agitated, he rubbed his cheek with the back of his hand. ‘I’ll tell yer this though. If I stand still, I’ll turn ter stone, an’ that’s the God’s truth. You know how much I earn as a brickie, Sunday – huh, do yer?’

Sunday shook her head.

‘Three bloody quid a week! Just tell me, where’s the justice, where’s a man’s dignity?’

Sunday felt embarrassed, and didn’t know what to say.

Then Joe collected his coat and cap from a hook behind the front door and put them on. ‘Will yer tell her inside I’m off ter the boozer for a snort.’

Sunday looked bewildered. ‘But Doll said we’ll be ready to eat in half an hour.’

‘Then half an hour it’ll be,’ he replied, opening the door. ‘Oh, and by the way,’ he said, turning back briefly, ‘I didn’t get that job out at Dagenham. They turned me down. No skills, yer see.’

Joe kept his promise, and came back exactly half an hour later. To his kids’ delight, he brought with him a vast slab of milk chocolate, which he had apparently bought on the black market from a casual customer over at the Nag’s Head pub. But it was kept as a special treat until after dinner at one o’clock.

To Sunday’s surprise, her day with the Mooney family turned out to be one of the best Christmases she had ever had. She hadn’t expected it to be so, not after Joe’s extraordinary exchange with her. In fact, he was amazingly appreciative of everything Doll had done, praising the way in which the turkey had been cooked, playing games with the kids, helping Barry to build a house with his Meccano set, and even doing the washing-up whilst Doll and Sunday had a sit-down in the afternoon. Doll, needless to say, worked like a Trojan. But, she clearly thoroughly enjoyed herself, especially during the evening when the family sat down to a game of Monopoly. To howls of protests from the kids, she appointed herself Banker, and cheated everyone in sight.

By the time she was ready to go home, Sunday was so blown-out with turkey and sausage-meat stuffing, roast potatoes, Brussels sprouts, carrots and cauliflower, Christmas pudding and mince pies, Spam and cheese-and-pickle sandwiches, and squares of milk chocolate, that she could hardly stand up.

When she got back to her own flat, she thought a great deal about the wonderful way in which the Mooneys had helped her to cope with her first Christmas on her own. Yes, she thought a lot about Doll, about Joe, and about the kids. Especially the kids.

In fact, it made her wish she had some of her own.

The day after Boxing Day, Sunday had a most peculiar and worrying letter from Jinx.

Dear Sun,

Bet you didn’t expect to hear from me again so soon!

What’s happened is that me and Junior are supposed to be travelling on the
Queen Mary
to New York at the beginning of January. But suddenly it’s all in doubt because of one BIG crisis! They won’t let me go!

Apparently, this bloke at the base down at Ridgewell has had it in for me ever since I married Erin, and says that I have no right to ‘be a drain on the American tax-payers’, because I was married to Erin for too short a time before he died. What it all boils down to is that they won’t give me a permit to travel! What a Yankee git this bloke is!

Anyway, to cut a long story short, I have to go and see this bloke and see if I can talk some sense into him. He’s agreed to see me on 30 December down at the Base, which is only three days before I’m due to leave! The thing is, you know what I’m like. I go to pieces having to talk to people like this, and I desperately need someone to come along and support me. I
hate
to ask you, Sun, but could you do it? Don’t worry, you won’t have to get involved or anything, just sit there so’s I know I’ve got someone I can trust. I’ll pay all your fares and things, and as me mam’s going to look after Junior for the night, I’m pretty sure we can put up at the King’s Head or somewhere. I
hate
to ask you, Sun – but I really am
desperate
!

If you can make it, could you meet me at the ‘K.H.’ at about midday on the Sunday (30th)? If
you
can’t, could you phone and leave a message at our local postie down here? The number’s Swansea 53291. You’re a brick!

Hope to see you.

Love from Jinx (
and
Junior!)

Sunday was alarmed by Jinx’s letter, and absolutely astonished by the callousness of this pokey little snipe at the base. How could he do such a thing, she asked herself? How could he add to the suffering that Jinx had had to endure: a baby like Junior with no father, a loyal and devoted wife with no husband? That’s it then. She would go down and support her old mate. And God help that brass hat if he tried it on with
her
!

The journey down to Ridgewell was bitterly cold. As usual, the initial train departure from Liverpool Street was late, and then the poor old unheated bus from Braintree to Great Yeldham seemed to take for ever. By the time Sunday got off at the Waggon and Horses pub, she felt as though time had stood still, for everything was the same as she had remembered on that ice-cold November day when she first arrived. And as she made her way up the main road towards Ridgewell, she realised that she had never really seen this lovely, gentle countryside in the heart of summer. In some ways, it was painful to return, and she never thought she would have the courage to do so. Too many memories of such a short but amazingly eventful few months. But at least the sun was shining, and as she walked briskly along, clutching her small overnight holdall in one hand, the bare branches of the trees were sparkling with a sheen of white frost. Eventually, she reached the outskirts of the village, and it was then that she felt the first surge of excitement at the prospect of seeing Jinx again.

The moment she entered the public bar at the King’s Head, Sunday was amazed at the transformation. Not that
the
pub itself looked any different, but that the sea of khaki uniforms, combat jackets, crushed hats and peaked caps had been replaced by no more than a few locals in Sunday best. It was puzzling, and for a few moments Sunday wished she wasn’t there. Luckily, she was nearly a quarter of an hour early, so she went to the counter, and was about to buy a drink from a barmaid that she hadn’t seen before when the local carpenter, whom she had only ever known as John, came up to her.