Our Time Is Gone

by James Hanley

  13 EDCOTT COURT,

  September 21st, 1916.

  MY DEAR DENNY,

  It’s such a long time since I heard from you that I’m worried. Do write to me as soon as you get this letter. How are you? Are you all right? I hope you’re not sick or anything. I can imagine what it’s like on that ship now, in the middle of the sea and this dreadful war on. I’ve written you three times now, and never a reply. Do write if you can. I want to tell you so much. Oh, Denny, I wish you were home. I keep thinking of you every night, praying for you. You don’t know how I’m thinking of you, because it is only now I realize that you are everything—everything to me, Denny, and when I think of the waste, and the foolishness and all I did for those children—never thinking of you—though you know in your heart really, I mean all these years—how much you mean to me. But I feel I’ve neglected you. I shan’t be sorry when this war is over, and when you come back you’ll find me a different woman. Nothing matters now so long as you are safe, and come back and settle down. We’ll have a little place of our own, you see! Sometimes I could cry, when I think of the things I’ve done and I never told you anything. But I did it for the children. I see now what that meant. Driving them, driving them, doing for them, but always I did it with the best heart in the world. But as Mrs. Gumbs here often says to me, big hearts are one thing, and big purses another. Well, here’s a surprise for you, if ever there was one. Two surprises, in fact.

  Anthony’s getting married. Would you believe it? You know, Denny, I was only thinking the other day, Anthony’s the best of all the children. He really is. And we used to call him the soft cod of our family! He actually brought his girl along to see me—a good sweet girl, and very respectable. I got the shock of my life when I saw her. And none of the others ever brought their girls or their young men along. They just got married and that was that. But this girl, Joan Lynch is her name, her father comes from Dublin and is a solicitor in Gelton. She treated me as though I were her own mother. I was delighted with it. My heart went out to both of them. It was nice of them the way they took me out to tea, and then to the theatre afterwards. I’ll always remember that lovely day. He’s gone off again now, but he hopes to get married in October. He’s grown bigger it seems to me, if it’s possible to grow when you’re twenty-four. He told me he wants to stay in the Navy altogether and become a gunnery officer. Sometimes his girl comes round to see me. And I’ve seen Peter. Think of that. Yes I’ve seen him.

  A letter came from Mr. Trears and I had to go to his office. He offered me my fare, but I had my own. Well, that journey was awful. I thought I would never get there. But oh, it was sad to see him there. You wouldn’t know him. He’s a man. I saw that at once. And I knew he was moving away from me. Poor lad! We talked for half an hour or more, I forget exactly how long. But it was dreadful. The cold and the bareness of the place, it reminded me of that Irish mountain you took me up years ago, cold and bleak and bare. He broke down, and so did I.

  We were in a little room, and a man’s eye watching us all the time. I’ll never forget that eye so long as I live, and I never thought men did such things; but Peter told me to watch the door, and there sure enough there was a little slit in the door and I saw his eye. I asked him what he was going to do with himself if he ever got out. He’ll be over thirty, if he stays the full time. It’s dreadful. But he says if he offers to go to the war he’ll get free, and sure that’s as bad as the other, and I dread him going off like that. As for the rest of it, that bell going and the awful clock ticking, ticking; I saw a man there who spoke not a single word the whole time. I can’t tell you about what it was like leaving, and when I got into the train to go home, I wasn’t worth a pin. Still I’ve seen him, and he looks well—the hard work I expect.

  I thought of what you used to say to me about him—when I saw how strong and well he looked. Perhaps they would have been better children if I’d left them to you, I don’t know, yet nothing will ever tell me that Peter had not when he left our home in Hatfields to go to Ireland—nothing will ever tell me that he didn’t have the priest’s goodness in him. It’s destroyed, it’s gone now—and what destroyed it I’ll never know. Was it me, Denny, d’you suppose? I suppose you often think so. Well, no matter. He’s grown, no longer a boy—and Anthony’s off in October. Denny, our time is going, true to God it is. It’s going, and now I keep hoping and hoping that one day you’ll come home from the sea and we’ll have ourselves together, and this time for good. It seems odd to me that though we’ve had nearly forty-five years of married life I hardly know you, and it’s when all the family’s scattered that I’ve got to begin—begin understanding you. And by the way Anthony says to me, Why couldn’t we go and live with them when they get married? But that’s not right. There’s Peter left of course. But I’ve built so many homes, and shifted so many places I just feel tired. Well, Denny, you will not forget to write me. Do tell me how you are, and remember that no matter whatever I said or did, why, I’ve always thought the whole world of you. I’m working now. But that won’t surprise you, for I’ve worked before, but that was to push Peter along and I hid all that from you. This time it’s different. I’m working and saving. Please God we’ll have that trip home to Ireland one of these days, for I’ve longed all my life for a sight of it, and I don’t know really how it will look. But don’t you long for it yourself too? After years and years of the black holds of ships, Denny, and all my tramping up and down, up and down to those horrible shipping offices. Of course you long for it, just as I do. So you see why I am working. And not only that, but it makes me feel rested, more contented. I’m among entire strangers. I like that.

  Maybe I was at Hatfields too long. I don’t know. Sometimes of course I do think of that old house. Ah, sure you must yourself, Denny. We had bad times there, but we had good ones too, and I often think of the fire that never went out and the big table, and all the children there. We’ve had some happy times, after all. As to what I’m working at I won’t say. And don’t be worrying yourself.

  In your last letter you asked me have I heard from any of the others. I don’t know what you mean by the others, unless it’s the children. The answer’s no. But that’s wrong, of course. I had a letter from Desmond in London. A long letter. You never read the like of it. Full of talk about an estate he’s been to see in Ireland. He put a cheque in the letter, but I sent it back of course. I don’t ever want that sort of thing from anybody, much less my own children. With Anthony it’s different. His heart’s behind it. But I haven’t forgotten my time in that hospital, nor what you said about him promising to come. All I know is that he didn’t come. And that’s that. As for Maureen I haven’t heard a word. I don’t bother now. In the old days I would have worn myself out till I saw her and settled things. Her poor husband has gone through the mill all right. I had a letter from him some time ago. A woman by the name of Ditchley brought it along. I never thought I’d be found, but I was—so there you are. Mr. Kilkey was called up to the war, and according to what he says in his letter, he’s in prison at Conton—it was a mistake. Anyhow he wouldn’t go, refusing to fight like many of these conscientious objectors have been doing, and they dragged him out of his own house, and he was taken away. Now he’s in this prison with a lot of others, shifted from an army camp to Conton gaol with not much hope of getting home before the war is over. I was surprised. I never thought he was a man like that.

  He has been a good husband to that girl. Well, one of these days Maureen will learn on which side her bread is buttered.

  Gelton is the same as ever. Thousands of men are being killed, a lot from this neighbourhood too, and I heard yesterday about all this trouble in Ireland. Young boys and girls there shooting at each other. I hope that doesn’t last long. My grandfather used to say that wars were no good to Ireland and never would be. We’ll see. Now I must close, Denny. I have to go out to get some bread and potatoes, and I must post this letter then. Don’t forget to write, for it is a powerful long time since I heard from y
ou. Every night I hear those old horns blowing, and I do be thinking of you then.

  Christ keep you, your affectionate wife,

  FANNY.

  She sat back in the chair. Suddenly she laughed, saying: ‘Well! Well! It’s surely the longest letter I’ve written to the man. I’ll post it at once.’

  Having sealed it, she got up, put on her hat and coat, felt in her pocket to make sure she had the key. Then she went out. One or two people passed her on the stairs, said: ‘Good morning,’ to which she replied, ‘A beautiful day to-day, isn’t it?’

  It was a beautiful day. The sun shone, drenched Edcott Court, lit up the windows, flung shadows upon the walls, made Mrs. Fury twelve feet long as she walked across the concrete yard and so out of the court. The sun was everywhere to-day. People said how wonderful it was after the torrential rain. Almost a golden day for Gelton.

  Mrs. Fury reached the shop, bought her requirements, then stepped into the post office next door. As she stamped the letter and went up to the pillar box to drop it in, the thought came to her again. What really happened after these letters were posted? Did Denny get any of them? She glanced at the address again as she slipped the letter in. ‘H.M.T. Ronsa, c/o G.P.O. London.’

  ‘It’s strange,’ she thought. ‘I’ve never been so long without a letter before.’ She felt a little frightened by this long silence, and not all Mrs. Gumbs’s assurances could drown it out. She felt more than frightened, insecure.

  You went off to your work but all the time you were there, the thoughts kept leaping into your head! Where was his ship? In what part of the world? In which sea? Had something happened? Why didn’t Denny write? Two words would do. ‘Am well.’ You came home and at night you couldn’t sleep. One time you could have bought the Shipping News, looked up the whereabouts of your husband’s ship, but now the war was on. Everything was secret, darkness covered everything. No address was given. Simply c/o G.P.O. You were in the air. You knew nothing.

  She returned to Edcott Court still perturbed. She knew she would think about his ship all the rest of the day. Why should she be so worried by this? She thought of what Mrs. Gumbs had said.

  ‘Well, Mrs., all I can say is this. You worry far too much and a lot of it is downright nonsense. There’s not a woman alive in the land who hasn’t got to worry too.’

  ‘I’m becoming a coward,’ she thought. ‘One time I would never have been like this.’ She began to hate herself. She was certain she was becoming a coward. She had fits of depression. In the midst of them Denny appeared, as though a word, a thought had suddenly forced him over that far horizon, the horizon she always saw, dreamed about, over which his ship passed and repassed. There he was, in the flesh, living, this man she had lived a whole life with, yet hardly knew. There he was in the room, in the bed, on the stairs, behind her going to work. He was everywhere. She thought of nothing else. All the others were gone. She could never be certain any more. They were well out of it. The world around her was dwindling, and there was only Denny to hang on to. She cried at times, with great bitterness, loathing herself. She was losing her spirit.

  Mrs. Gumbs saw this, and wisely said nothing. She knew Fanny Fury. It was a mania. A sudden mania about her husband, about being left alone. That she did understand. But sympathy seemed wasted. Mrs. Fury went to and from work daily, and they hardly spoke. Once or twice Mrs. Gumbs said: ‘Well, perhaps he’ll be home to-morrow. Never know. That’s the way these days. It takes a ship to give surprises, Mrs. I know, I’ve seen it, seeing it every day.’ She cheered the woman up.

  In the evening Mrs. Fury went to chapel. She would sit sometimes for an hour in the bench, looking at the altar, thinking of her husband. She thought of nobody else. She had seen Peter, and felt that she wouldn’t see him again. Anthony was practically gone. Maureen seemed dead. As for Desmond, she didn’t even try to understand. There was only Denny. She must think of him all the time. She must hang on. ‘Ireland’s just a dream,’ and any black hole with Denny is better than all the green of Ireland without him.

  She returned to her room. Whilst the midday meal was cooking she took down a small black leather case from a cupboard, and placing it on her knee she began examining its contents. It was like running through the dead bones of old days. The family’s history, her efforts, her husband’s devil-may-care attitude, his indifference to her one blind hope. John’s short story told by old Union cards, and a telegraph form yellow with age. But what she sought she could never find. A whole history that was now burnt and she had forgotten with what frenzy, with what finality she had destroyed it. Her fingers rumbled through the piles of papers and letters. You rumbled through it and nothing ever came out of it. It passed the time away. She closed the box and put it back in the cupboard. Then she helped herself to some stew from the pot. Above she heard Mrs. Gumbs scrubbing her floor.

  How different that woman was! Went her way through the world without a sound. Nobody came to see her. She didn’t want anybody. She was quite happy.

  ‘Living’s working.’—‘People are all right if you look at them in their way.’—‘There are no short cuts to anything.’

  ‘She’s a different woman to me,’ thought Fanny. ‘I’ve had struggles and I liked struggle—but now it’s different. I must be getting tired.’

  Often she talked to herself in this way as she ate her meals, or pottered about cleaning the room. She often looked at the post-office bank book she had. She was actually saving. But the book meant more. It was an oath, a determination to do something. She—Denny, they would get out of it. Away from it all. Sometimes she laughed, thinking about it. Saving after nearly fifty years.

  ‘They’re shooting each other to pieces, but what does that her? It’s our own home.’

  Sometimes Denny seemed to be standing behind her, peering over her shoulder at this bank-book. She had told him about it, and he had written back to her:

  ‘Well, Fanny, you’re a strange woman. You call that waste of money, after me going and making all those arrangements for you to have the little rest at Mount Mellery, and yet I saved myself one time.’

  ‘Just like Denny to remind her of that! As though I don’t know. We’ll go back home no better than the day we left it. Well, it doesn’t matter. It’s Ireland—our own home.’

  It became an obsession. She was saving up, working, saving, hoping, gradually forgetting, letting slip from her all the accumulated memories of fifty years of Gelton. It was all going. She was getting ready for a pilgrimage. After dinner she went to bed, and did not wake again until she heard the familiar signal from above, Mrs. Gumbs rapping on the floor with a stick. It was half-past five. She got up now, washed herself. Then she went upstairs to Mrs. Gumbs’s room.

  Tuesdays and Fridays she had a meal with Mrs. Gumbs before they went off to work. Mondays and Thursdays Mrs. Gumbs came down to Mrs. Fury’s room.

  Mrs. Gumbs was not only fully dressed and ready for her work, but she was able to inform her friend of all the details concerning it. She hoped she was in a happier frame of mind to what she had been this morning.

  ‘To-night you had to have a happy mood, otherwise you wouldn’t work.’

  What did she mean? ‘I’m not unhappy—but I’m worried.’

  ‘You always say that,’ Mrs. Gumbs said. ‘Well, if you’re still feeling that way, Mrs., I strongly advise you not to go to work this night. It’s the dirtiest ship that has ever sailed into the river. So I’m told. And not only that, but they’re employing over sixty women to work on the cleaning of her. I don’t know how they’d ever win their war, really I don’t, if it wasn’t for us. A dirty filthy hospital ship. You’ll find more than a leg believe me, Mrs., and before you’re back in your bed you’ll be feeling ashamed of yourself for talking like you do. Sure, worrying won’t help anybody—certainly not you.’

  ‘You don’t know me, and you don’t know my husband,’ replied Mrs. Fury. ‘I’ll go on worrying about Denny until I see him in that room below, standing before my eyes.’
>
  ‘Well, I confess I don’t know you, Mrs., nor your husband, but if he worries as much as you do then—oh, come on. Let’s get out into the air,’ and she pushed her chair away, got up, put out the stove. ‘How d’you like this hat?’ she asked. ‘I only got it this morning, and I only paid two shillings for it. I made it up myself, really.’

  ‘A very nice hat, just suits you.’

  ‘Well, that’s something! I used to be told that I had a face that wouldn’t suit any hat that was ever made.’ She opened the door. ‘I thought we might walk slowly down, and go along the jetty for a bit. We could sit there till about a quarter to. I hate being in the house in such lovely weather. And my, you will want fresh air to-night!’ she concluded, as Mrs. Fury passed out and she closed the door, and gave it a push to see it was securely locked.

  They made their way slowly towards the docks, talked of German prisoners arrived at Gelton that day. Now and again Mrs. Gumbs stood to look at herself in a shop window.

  ‘I rather like this hat, you know. It does suit me.’

  ‘Well! Here we are! My! What a crowd of women going aboard. Never seen so many before,’ remarked Mrs. Gumbs. ‘Now then,’ she grasped her companion’s arm. ‘No! Not down that gangway. Down this,’ she said, and pulled Mrs. Fury after her, who was looking at some men being carried ashore on stretchers. Above their heads decks were being washed clean of blood.

  ‘They’re probably sick members of the crew,’ said Mrs. Fury as she walked down the gangway behind Mrs. Gumbs. They reached an alleyway.

  ‘Dead ones more likely,’ replied Mrs. Gumbs. ‘I think we go this way.’

  It was a long alleyway dimly lit. It was crowded with men. They pushed past each other, all seemed in a terrible hurry, they carried tools, buckets, bundles of blankets.

  ‘Keep to the bulkhead,’ said a quartermaster.