Brothers Far from Home

by Jean Little

  I am still amazed to be so enjoying writing this journal. I wonder what is different about me. I have suddenly become more interested in myself as though I am watching myself change into somebody else. I told Mother this and she said, “Well, Eliza, you are changing. You are beginning to outgrow little girl Eliza and starting to grow into Eliza, the young woman. Every day that passes, I am catching glimpses of her.”

  She was gazing at me in that significant way she has. It means she is telling me important news about myself.

  I went red and stammered out something about not wanting to grow up yet.

  Mother laughed. “Yes, you do, Eliza. Some of the time. It will grow easier. You’ll see.”

  Dear Reader, does your mother say such things? I am only twelve.

  I wish I could talk to Hugo about how strange I feel these days. I miss him so. When I was Belle’s age I was terrified of the dark. I had to go to bed ahead of Verity, so I was all alone in our room for what seemed like hours. I would lie awake shivering. They all told me not to be foolish, but nothing helped. Then Hugo bought me a penny whistle. He showed me how to play it and told me to take it to bed with me because it was magic. “It will help you banish the dark,” he said.

  Then he taught me to sit up, face the part of the room which was darkest and play my whistle at it. Sure enough, the darkness seems to back away and grow thinner. You do not turn on a light. You look into the night and play a tune and all the fearful things melt away.

  I keep it in the drawer with my ribbons and sashes and handkerchiefs now. I think I will get it out. When I pray for Hugo to be safe, I can send him a whistle. Jack told me that the soldiers cannot light candles or lanterns after dark because that would tell the enemy where to fire. I wonder if Hugo is ever afraid. He is so tall and gay. I cannot imagine him fearful.

  Writing so much makes my hand ache. Yet I cannot stop. I think it is partly due to you, dear Reader, that I am liking journal keeping. Telling you things turns my life into a story like Eight Cousins or Anne of Green Gables.

  Later

  I am not one bit like Verity, thank Fortune.

  “When you take up your diary,” she said to me this morning, “you can record your New Year’s Resolutions and then, next year, check to see if you carried them out.”

  Her tone said she knew I would fail but she thought it would be good for me to make the attempt. Verity is forever trying to reform me, but I am like Mother and I believe that Father treasures my outrageous side also.

  “Why should I?” I asked her. “I’m perfect just the way I am.”

  Then I hummed a few bars of Just As I Am, Without One Plea to tease her. I thought she’d preach at me but, for once, she pretended not to hear.

  She said I had better read hers so I would know what sort of thing to write. “My resolutions won’t be at all like yours,” I said. But I was curious. So I took her book and waited for her to leave the room. Finally she went. I am going to write down her resolutions so I can tease her when I catch her breaking one.

  New Year’s Resolutions of Verity Susan Bates

  January, 1917

  Each one starts out “I resolve” so I’ll skip that bit after the first one.

  1. I resolve to tell the truth in these pages and to write in my diary every day.

  2. to try to grow closer to Our Heavenly Father and to pray faithfully night and day.

  3. to be a kind big sister and to set Eliza and the little ones a good example.

  4. to write to Hugo, and Jack, and keep their spirits up as they fight for our country.

  5. to help Mother with the housework and do so cheerfully.

  6. to study harder so that I may be an informed wife and mother some day.

  7. to practise the violin every day and not to mind the family’s teasing.

  8. to keep my clothes tidy.

  9. to keep my temper.

  10. to make my parents proud of me.

  They sound just like Verity herself, stuffy and proper. She already keeps most of them. Her clothes are always tidy and she plays that dratted violin until I long to throw it on the floor and jump up and down on it. Yet, between you and me and the gatepost, I admit I am impressed. If she can do it, she will become a saint yet.

  I will write more when I have found a completely private place in which to write to you, dear Reader. It isn’t easy. I keep moving the journal from my pillow case to my bottom dresser drawer to under the bed. Yet I cannot risk leaving my journal where any of the family, especially Verity, could dip into it without my knowledge. You would think a minister’s daughter could be counted on to be honourable at all times. Rubbish!

  I vow I will never marry a minister. I don’t want my children to bear the burden of being The Preacher’s Kids. Being such paragons is too much to ask — even of Verity.

  Early Wednesday Morning

  January 3

  I did a dreadful thing. I wounded Verity. And I did it because of this very journal. I came into the room quietly, not wanting to wake her, and I caught her looking at my journal. Snooping! Nosey Parker.

  I snatched it out of her hand and backed away. Then she smirked. She really did. I know it does not sound like something such a Goody Girl would do, but there is no other word for it. So I grabbed up my silver-backed mirror that Grandmother gave me when I was six and flung it at her head. She had turned away before I threw it, but she turned back. The handle caught her just above her left eye. Her alabaster brow, as Anne Shirley would say. It is bruised and swollen and I said I was sorry. But she had no right to pry into my private book.

  Luckily the mirror landed on the carpet and did not break or I would have brought seven years of bad luck on myself.

  Verity bawled like a newborn calf, of course. You would think I had run her through with a sword instead of merely giving her a knock on her noggin. Everyone came running. Nobody took my side. Even Susannah looked shocked, as though she’d never seen blood shed before. That settles it. I will find a foolproof hiding place for my journal before I sleep tonight.

  Later on

  I forgot to mention that we are back at school. The teacher’s name is Mr. Royle. He is forever giving some poor boy the strap. I am afraid of him. I liked my teacher in Guelph much better.

  One of the girls’ older brothers said that Mr. Royle was nicer before the War. Someone put a white feather on his desk last fall. They give those out to men who are too cowardly to enlist when their country needs them. Father says it is inhuman and he never wants to hear of one of us taking part in such a thing. As if we would! I don’t like the teacher, but nobody should be humiliated, especially if he is really afraid. When Hugo gave me my penny whistle he told me that everyone is afraid at times, even the bravest of men. I wanted to ask if he had ever been really frightened but I didn’t do it. Father is quite right about such questions being inhuman.

  The boy laughed when he said Mr. Royle turned as white as the feather when he saw it lying there!

  If men don’t enlist, it doesn’t necessarily mean they’re cowards. They won’t take you if you have poor eyesight or flat feet or a bad heart. Mr. Royle wears thick glasses that make his eyes huge and frightening — they would keep him out of the army. After all, you have to see well to shoot straight. What if you shot one of your fellow soldiers by mistake!

  The girls were right about my having to share a desk with Cornelia. She came back yesterday. But, after just one day, she got the sniffles and had to stay home again. When she plumped herself down next to me, she took up more than half the seat. It is not that she is so stout but that she wears so many layers of clothing. When we had to read, Mr. Royle skipped her as though she did not exist. I told her she had missed her turn.

  “I don’t have to do it,” she said. “I’m too sensitive. My father told him. I have special problems.”

  If her eyes are bad, how on earth can she embroider night and day? I asked Father about it. He said Dr. Webb is a School Trustee and he also said not to tease Cornelia. I would
not tease anybody. Well, I do tease my brothers and sisters, but that is different.

  I found my private place for you, dear Reader, before we left for school. I am seated on the trunk my grandmother brought with her from Yorkshire. It is in the lumber room in the cellar. I am sure nobody but myself will come here. When I finish writing, I will hide the journal inside the trunk and take the key with me. No, I will hide the key down here too or I might lose it somewhere upstairs. I do lose things. There’s enough light coming in through a small dusty window high in the wall above me and I brought candles in case it grows too dark.

  Keeping this journal is so different. It will be easier to write about new things happening than just to keep writing about the same old things day after day. Even the War seems to keep repeating itself, as though the soldiers from each side were stuck on one bit of ground and they just keep fighting over it like dogs with a bone, only they aren’t dogs. They are men killing other men, day after day. Mother has the saddest look on her face every time she reads the casualty lists in the newspaper, as if every name she reads is a son of hers. I have thought of hiding the paper but they would just hunt until they found it.

  I just remembered what Verity said about resolutions. If I am going to write them, I should do it, but they will not be like hers. I should be filled with admiration for such a sister, but she is too good to be true. Hugo says she is training for sainthood. Presbyterians do not have saints, though, and I cannot imagine Verity becoming a Roman Catholic.

  I am going to promise myself a couple of things but I will keep them simple. I will only write about things I want to write about and I will try to tell the truth and still make a good story out of it. That’ll do.

  I already told you about my eyes, didn’t I? I don’t care that my hair is straight or if I am too thin or anything, but I do wish I had no squint. None of the girls at school here has said anything yet in my hearing, but I know they will. I have heard them laughing about other girls and boys, Cornelia especially, in that secretive, gloating way mean girls have. They will get around to me. Maybe they already have. I don’t care about them, but I do want more friends than just Cornelia.

  Change the subject, Eliza Mary, or you will get tears on your journal.

  I have told you a lot about the boys and Verity, dear Reader. Now I had better tell you more about Belle and the Twins, since I have not said too much about them so far. Susannah and Charlie were born on Christmas Day eight years ago. Mother said, “Father Christmas has a strange sense of humour. I asked for a new stove.” My mother is fond of joking. We celebrate their birthday at the end of November. Christmas is too busy in a minister’s house to add a double birthday into it. Then there is Belle, the baby, who turns five the day after tomorrow. She is a darling most of the time, although not always. She has been sick a lot and has terrible bilious attacks. She is very small for her age.

  Having a minister for our father is not always easy but ours is better than most. Marjorie Leslie, who is also a preacher’s child, cannot remember ever hearing her father laugh out loud or make a joke. In her house they never play games. He kisses their foreheads. And when they kneel by their chairs in the morning for family prayers, he tells God each little thing they have done wrong and asks for forgiveness for each one. All the Leslie children dread family prayers, dear Reader, and I do not blame them. We just fold our hands, close our eyes and bow our heads. I found out that Father and Mother used to kneel when they were first married and then she told him that she couldn’t pray properly when her knees were aching so badly.

  “He gave me a quizzical look,” she said, “and the next day, we stayed on our chairs.”

  My father keeps family prayers much shorter and never mentions names except to ask for special blessings when someone is going away or writing a big examination or something. Now, of course, he prays for the boys, first ours and then all the rest. There are so many Uxbridge boys overseas. When he is not praying, he teases and tells funny stories. He says God wants us to have “merry hearts” and he can quote a Bible verse to prove it. Mother says he can quote scripture to prove anything. Grandmother says the Devil can quote scripture too. This is confusing.

  Oh, I almost forgot Ezekiel, our parrot. My uncle brought him from a pet shop as a present for Hugo’s first birthday. They let him out of his cage and the first thing he did was bite Hugo’s little finger. He still has a tiny scar. African Grey parrots are great talkers. Ezekiel actually swears. We did not teach him to. When there is a church meeting at the manse, we cover his cage. Sometimes he calls out things like “Moses and Aaron!” or “Jumping Jehosophat!” Once, when Mrs. Logan was visiting, Ezekiel said, “Holy haberdashery!” It is one of the expressions Father made up to take the place of swearing. When Uncle Jack bought him, he did not know that parrots can live to be eighty years old! He could still be around when Belle is an elderly lady.

  Thursday, January 4

  After I threw the mirror at her, and a bruise appeared, Verity started combing her bangs back so everyone would ask her how she had hurt herself. (She usually wears her hair in a bang which hides her eyebrows.) Mother saw me looking small this morning when one of the Ducks asked about it. After the old lady took herself off, my darling mother said, “You begged for that fringe of yours, Verity Susan. Now you either comb it down again, or I will personally cut it off. You know quite well that Eliza did not injure you on purpose.”

  Verity flounced off and came back with the bruise out of sight.

  But I did do it on purpose, dear Reader. If you had told me the mirror would strike her, I still would have gone right ahead and let fly. Maybe I am a lost soul. I asked Father and he told me not to put on airs.

  I wish I would get a whole letter from Hugo. I would like to receive one written just to me, but that is hard, I suppose, when you have to remember so many of us. In his last letter he put in, “Tell Monkeyshines that I miss her and I will be coming home soon to pull her pigtails.” I wouldn’t mind what he did as long as he came home safe and sound. He is a prince among brothers.

  We are all waiting for the War to end. Father says it will not be soon, but the rest of us have higher hopes. When it started I remember people saying it would be “over by Christmas.” Mr. Stephens from down the street offered to bet on it, but Father refused. He said later that Theodore Stephens was a fool. Father said wars are easy to start but hard to finish — like any other human quarrel. He is almost always right, but I hope he is wrong this once.

  When it began, in 1914, it seemed very far away and unreal to me. I was just nine, after all, and I didn’t even think about it unless an adult was talking about it. But now that my two big brothers have taken up arms and gone so far from home, I see things differently. It has grown much more real and even frightening. At times, it is thrilling. Then I remember how terrible it is, especially when I see Father and Mother worrying so. They try not to let it show when we are around, but I catch glimpses.

  Later

  I almost got caught. Just as I opened the cellar door, Big Sister spotted me. Her ears look exactly like question marks. I noticed it particularly.

  “Where are you going?” said she.

  I nearly shot back, “None of your beeswax,” but stopped myself in time. Grandmother calls it a vulgar expression only used by vulgar people. Instead I stalked off with my nose in the air. I can see I may have to move my journal around the house from time to time. My sister is like Sherlock Holmes. Nothing escapes her once she begins wondering.

  Cornelia Webb was back at school again. She is as white as a blancmange and her eyes are small and washed out. They remind me of some pale bluey-green marbles Charlie had once. I should not say one word about her eyes, though. After all, she does not have a squint like her seat mate. Maybe it is only her spectacles. She wears them in school when she struggles to read and she wears them when she sews. When she takes them off, her eyes water and she blinks all the time. Her eyes don’t tell you anything about what she is feeling or thinking. They
never laugh.

  She is not friendly to me, but maybe she is shy. She is a year older than me even though she is in my class. When she had to recite, she stumbled over the simplest words and she was only saying “You Are Old, Father William.” It practically recites itself.

  When she got stuck and coughed, Mr. Royle let her off. His voice was snappish but she looked thankful. I think something is wrong with her.

  Her family is Presbyterian but, for some reason, they no longer attend church. There are only three Webb children. Her house is so quiet that it is hard to believe there are people moving about inside it. In our house there is always noise, someone singing, the Twins and Belle scrapping, Father roaring “Who hid my spectacles?” or “Who took the newspaper?”, Mother talking to herself, Verity practising her violin or elocution, Susannah or myself practising on the piano. Or Ezekiel, of course. He says things like, “Move along, sir.” Or “Brush your hair, you bad girl.” Jack taught him that.

  But the Webbs are probably extra quiet right now because of worrying about Cornelia’s brother, Richard. He was serving at the battle of the Somme. Father can scarcely speak about it. The Germans used mustard gas and our troops were not ready. Father says mustard gas will be outlawed once people stop to think what they are doing, since it does terrible things to men who breathe it in. I had not thought about it until he told me this. It is evil because it attacks anyone who it reaches, a child, an animal, anyone. Also, if the wind shifts, it goes right back after the people who just fired it. If you are wearing your gas mask, I think you will not be killed, but men get careless when no gas attack comes for a while. A gas mask is hot and “damnably uncomfortable.” I am quoting Father. And think of the horses and dogs!

  Anyway, the Webbs’ son Richard was at that battle and they have not heard from him in months. But he has not been reported as wounded or killed or taken prisoner. It must be terrible for them. I told Cornelia I was sorry but she just turned her head away and muttered, “Don’t talk about it. Don’t.” And a few minutes later, she asked me to come over and play after school as if it were any old day and she had nothing on her mind.