War Babies

by Annie Murray

‘Poor Evie having a mom like Mrs Sutton,’ Melanie said. ‘I’m glad you’re my mom.’

  ‘Well, that’s nice.’ Rachel thought she’d better change the subject. ‘When you and Cissy’re big girls you’ll be able to go and see each other, won’t you?’

  They were chatting about Cissy, who Melanie was in love with in the way that little girls sometimes adore each other, and she was still talking all about their games when Gladys and Danny came in. Rachel pulled all her resolve together. She was going to be the very best she could for Danny! She had to make things better.

  ‘Oh, you’re back!’ she cried, getting up. She went and kissed Danny and said, ‘Tea’s ready – and the kettle’s on. I’ve nearly finished feeding his nibs.’

  Gladys sat down with a groan. ‘Ooh – feels a long way up there and back.’ She looked pale and exhausted.

  ‘Here – I’ll get you a cuppa . . . Danny, love – could you take over feeding Tommy while I make the tea?’

  Danny looked panic-stricken. ‘I don’t know how.’

  ‘Just feed him a little bit at a time – gently. He has a job getting it down – you’ve seen me do it.’

  I mustn’t stand over him – I must just let him do it, she thought. She went to mash the tea. ‘How are they all?’

  ‘They’re all right,’ Gladys said. ‘Jess is courting again – they say he’s a nice enough lad so we hope it’ll last this time. And Amy’s leaving school in a few weeks.’ Her face clouded for a moment. ‘She’s an odd child. I hope she’ll be all right.’

  ‘What’ll she do?’ Rachel asked. She glanced over at Danny, who had so far said not a word. She saw him try to spoon food into Tommy’s mouth. Tommy writhed and spat all of it out down his chin. She saw a look of disgust come over Danny’s face.

  ‘Here,’ she said gently, taking the tea to the table. ‘I’ll do it, love. I’m used to it.’

  Danny nodded and got up. He said he needed the lav and went out of the house.

  ‘How was it really, Auntie?’ Rachel asked as soon as he was out of earshot.

  Gladys shook her head sadly. ‘It was all right. Nancy and Albert were marvellous and the girls are doing all right. But they’re no more his sisters than any other wench out on the street. None of them said a word to each other all day.’

  Forty-One

  ‘Danny – are you feeling any better?’

  Rachel slipped into bed beside him as he lay in a restless doze. He had barely looked at her all evening and Rachel had thought he was upset about Jess and Amy. But he did not want to eat and eventually admitted that he didn’t feel well.

  ‘I’ve felt bad all day,’ he said. ‘My head’s thumping. I’ll have to go to bed.’

  Rachel and Gladys exchanged glances. ‘I thought he wasn’t looking too good,’ Gladys said as Danny climbed the stairs.

  Now Danny stirred and turned over to face her in bed.

  ‘I’m all right,’ he said. But it was obvious that he was not. He was shivering and boiling hot at the same time.

  ‘I brought you some water,’ she said.

  ‘Ta.’ Sitting up seemed a huge effort. He took a few sips and slumped down again. She could feel him waiting, though, as if for her to say something.

  ‘Was it nice to see them?’ she said, turning to embrace him. ‘Danny – you’re shaking!’

  ‘Yeah –’ His teeth were chattering. ‘Got a fever coming. I feel bad. Had it before. My head – it’s bad . . .’ Suddenly he clung to her and she held him, soothing him as his body shuddered.

  ‘I love you, Danny,’ she said, desperate to leap over the gulf between them.

  ‘Love you, girl,’ he said between chattering teeth. He sounded very drowsy and ill. He turned away from her and seemed to fall asleep, though he kept twitching and muttering.

  Although she was exhausted, Rachel felt too pent-up to sleep. She lay with her eyes open in the dark. Tonight she would have welcomed Tommy waking so that she could go and comfort him. She felt very alone. Tears seeped from her eyes into her hair. Talk to me, Danny, she wanted to cry to him. But he was sick and in no fit state. With her new intentions of that day, to get close to Danny again, to find the boy she loved inside this troubled man, she had thought they would lie and talk for hours, that she would gradually draw him back to her with all the love she could pour over him.

  So far, he had talked very little about the war. He said it was so vile and tedious that all he wanted was to forget it.

  ‘Four years down the toilet, that’s what it was,’ was mainly all she had got out of him. He didn’t seem to have much more to say about it. ‘All I ever wanted was to come home to you.’

  Every so often, when she had the energy, Rachel persevered and asked about India. And didn’t he say he had been in Burma? Some of the stories which were coming out about what the Japanese had done were so extreme that she was almost afraid to ask. Was there some terrible secret he was hiding?

  But Gladys asked sometimes as well. One evening, once the children were in bed, he had talked a little bit.

  ‘We were only in Burma a couple of weeks.’ Danny picked up the poker as he spoke, prodding at the floor with it, as if avoiding looking at them. It was this not looking that made Rachel feel worst. Where had he gone to, her Danny? Who was this Danny who could no longer meet her eye?

  ‘They signed us up with one of the Indian divisions and sent us in when everyone else was coming back the other way.’ He shook his head. ‘It wasn’t that long after I got out there. We had a bit of jungle training – huh, so much for that! May forty-three they sent us into Burma and told us to hold this pass called the Ng . . . Ngakeydauk . . . summat like that. The Okeydokey, we called it. It was so all the rest of them could clear out – the Japs flushing all our army back into India. Six days . . .’ He jabbed at the floor and shook his head with a cynical smile. ‘Jungle training . . . As if you could train for that hellhole. We weren’t in all that much fighting, not as such. But it felt as if they were there, all over the jungle, creeping up on you, every minute of the day and night. It was enough to send you round the bend. And the lads were dropping – sick as dogs. We got the hell out of there after that, those little yellow bastards chasing the lot of us out.’ He looked up at Gladys. ‘So yeah – Burma. Then it was back to Bihar and more bloody Indians.’

  She could not imagine India or Burma, or how it must have been. And it really did not seem as if Danny had much more to say about it. And yet, it was as if between the time she last saw him, in December 1942, and his homecoming, the real Danny had been stolen and replaced by someone else. His light-heartedness, his electric energy, all seemed to have vanished.

  Reaching out in the bed she laid her hand on his hot back. Eventually, she slept.

  She was woken by him vomiting over the side of the bed.

  ‘Danny!’ She leapt up. ‘Oh, no – I’ll get the bucket!’

  She stumbled downstairs, barefoot, returning with one of the buckets and a cloth. Upstairs again, she lit a candle and sat beside him, wiping his forehead as he strained and retched. He was shivering even more violently while he remained alarmingly hot at the same time. At last when he had finished he lay back, limp and feverish. Rachel wiped up the floor and crept down to empty out the bucket and rinse it with water from the pot on the stove. Then she took the bucket back up.

  As she reached the top of the attic stairs she saw that Danny was getting up.

  ‘I’ve got to go . . .’ He stumbled across the room. ‘The lav . . .’

  ‘But . . .’ It seemed such a long way.

  ‘S’all right . . . Used to it . . .’ he murmured.

  She heard him go out of the door. For a moment she sat there, stunned and queasy at the shock of being woken suddenly, and panicked at seeing Danny so ill.

  I might as well go out and get some more water, she thought, while I’m waiting. She took her shoes this time. Downstairs, the door was ajar. She paused behind it to slip her feet into her shoes, picked up the other bucket and went out
to the tap.

  The lamp shed a dim light. The night was cold and damp, the sky thick with cloud. With just a cardigan over her nightdress, she was soon shivering. As she stood filling the bucket, even the slow flow of water from the tap sounded loud in the dead hours of the night. But as she turned it off and was going back to the house, she heard a little whimpering sound.

  Her heart beat faster. Surely that wasn’t Danny? She stopped, listening, the bucket weighing down her left side. The sound came again, from her left, a thin, desolate wail. Then a high voice said, ‘Mo-om . . .’ and a grizzling crying followed. It was coming from the direction of the Suttons’ house. As she moved closer, she saw that there was a tiny someone sitting in the shadow of the doorway, curled up on the step.

  ‘Evie?’ She left the bucket and went to bend over the little girl. ‘What on earth’re you doing out here, babby?’

  Evie raised her blonde head from her knees. Rachel saw there was something draped over her legs, a coat or bit of blanket. Her face was stony with woe. Rachel sat beside her and put her arm around her. She knew the little girl well. Evie often came into their house.

  ‘Why’re you out here, Evie?’ She was beginning to simmer with rage at Irene. What in the name of God was she playing at, leaving this little one out on the doorstep? Had she got drunk with Ray and forgotten about her? ‘Evie?’ she repeated, when there was no answer.

  ‘Mom said,’ Evie hiccoughed the words out between sobs.

  My God, Rachel thought furiously. So it was no accident!

  ‘Did she say you’d been naughty, Evie?’

  The child nodded.

  ‘Why did she say you’d been naughty?’ The little girl did not seem to know, or remember. It was nothing, probably, Rachel thought, knowing Irene. Looking down she saw that Evie was barefoot. She wrapped her hands round each of her plump feet for a moment. They were icy. The poor child was freezing cold.

  Rachel got up and tried the front door. It was locked. They had gone to bed, deliberately locking Evie out. By God, she fumed, she’d be having words with Irene in the morning! She wanted to hammer on the door and demand that they get up and come and get their daughter. But she knew if she did that she would wake everyone else, even if Irene and Ray were stupefied with drink. And if they did wake, there was no telling how Evie would be treated.

  ‘Come on, babby,’ she said. ‘You can come and sleep with our Melly. Holding Evie’s hand, fetching the bucket as she went, she led her into the house. As she tucked her in at the other end of the mattress from Melly and Tommy, she started to worry about Danny. He was taking such a long time. Had he passed out in the lav? Her heart thumped harder again with fear.

  ‘There you go, littl’un.’ She stroked Evie’s hair and tucked the blanket around her. The child was giving tired little sobs. ‘You go to sleep now, babby, all right?’

  As she crept out again she heard Danny come staggering in downstairs. To her relief she could hear Gladys giving off little snores from her room. Thank goodness Gladys was such a good sleeper! She slipped her shoes off and hurried down again. Danny had sunk down onto a chair.

  ‘Danny – love?’ Panic-stricken, she laid a hand on his back. He seemed so terribly poorly. She had never known him as sick as this before. ‘Come back to bed – it’s cold.’

  ‘In a minute.’ Head down, he was gathering his strength. ‘This is malaria,’ he said. ‘You’ll have to go to the doc – get me the medicine.’

  ‘Malaria?’ She knew something about it being a disease people had in foreign countries. No one had it here, surely?

  ‘Got it in Burma, first time.’ He gathered his breath. ‘It comes back. Need quinine . . . Oh – I’m gonna be sick again!’

  Rachel seized an empty bowl just in time, panicking as Danny heaved and retched. Malaria – what did it mean? Was he going to die?

  When he was finished at last, Rachel cleaned the bowl and went back to him. Danny held out an arm. ‘Help me back to bed. Feel bloody terrible.’ Side by side they shuffled and squeezed up the narrow stairs to the attic. Holding him as they climbed, stopping often to rest and whispering words of encouragement to him, was the closest she had felt to Danny in a long time. He fell back into bed, shaking and shivering. She held him, warming him as he gradually slipped away into sleep.

  Forty-Two

  ‘Mom – why’s Evie in our bed?’

  Rachel opened her eyes blearily. It had been a terrible night. Danny had been up several times being sick and staggering out to the lavatory. He was sleeping more peacefully for the moment, completely worn out, his face drawn and sallow. Rachel felt she had barely slept at all. Melanie’s serious little face looked over the bedclothes at her.

  Evie! She had forgotten all about that. Anger drove her up and out of bed.

  ‘Evie just had to stop over with us,’ she told Melly, not wanting to start a long discussion about why and how. ‘I need to go and see her mom.’

  ‘She’s asleep,’ Melly said. ‘And Tommy’s awake.’

  ‘She’ll be all right, let her sleep,’ Rachel said. ‘You leave them both and get ready for school.’

  I wonder if Irene will even notice she’s gone? Rachel thought, pulling her dress over her head. She felt frayed with exhaustion and nerves. Was Danny going to be all right – should she get the doctor? Could he die of it? All the time as she got Tommy up and fed him, the worry jangled inside her, making her jump at the slightest thing.

  ‘Auntie!’ she cried as Gladys appeared downstairs. ‘Danny’s ever so bad – he’s been up all night being sick and he says he’s got malaria and he needs the doctor to give him some medicine . . .’

  ‘Malaria?’ Gladys said, bewildered. She stood hugging her shawl around her, over her skirt and blouse. ‘That’s some foreign thing. He must’ve brought it back with him.’

  ‘He says he needs the medicine . . .’ Rachel was almost crying. ‘And I found Evie out on the step last night and she’s been up with Melly, and I don’t know how I’m going to—’

  ‘Hang on, slow down – what?’ Gladys held her hand up. When Rachel explained about finding Evie outside she saw a cold, enraged look come over Gladys’s face. Her jaw clenched.

  ‘My God,’ she hissed, turning away to see to the stove. But a moment later, under control, she turned back to Rachel. ‘I’ll go for you – to the dispensary for Danny, soon as it opens. You’d best deal with Irene – I don’t trust myself.’

  But a few minutes later, Irene was out, bawling across the yard.

  ‘Evie? Get in ’ere – where’ve yow got to?’

  Before she even got to the door, Rachel heard Dolly’s voice.

  ‘What’s up with you, Irene – lost ’er again, have yer? You want to keep a better eye on your kids, you do.’

  ‘Who asked yower bleeding opinion?’ Irene retorted. ‘EVIE! Come on, babby – get ’ere, now. Stop messing about!’

  Trembling with rage at Irene, both for her treatment of Evie and at hearing the way she spoke to Dolly, Rachel burst out into the yard.

  ‘I’ll tell you where Evie is,’ she announced at the top of her voice. ‘I found her out on your doorstep in the middle of the night – and the door locked – as you know perfectly well. She’s in bed with my Melanie and that’s where she’s staying – although much you care so far as I can see. You ought to be locked up, the way you treat that child!’

  Irene bridled. She was dressed in a flowery frock, all pinks and pale greens and belted tightly at the waist, her hair newly peroxided, and a pair of black heels. Her stocking-less legs were lardy white against the shoes. All in all she was looking smug and self-satisfied. Things must be going all right with Ray, Rachel thought, so the stupid bint was full of herself, preening and prancing about.

  ‘Always got pennies for a new frock, haven’t you, Irene? It’s a pity you don’t spend it on feeding your family.’

  ‘So you’ve taken ’er, you interfering cowbag!’ She came marching across to Rachel. ‘Here’m I worrying myself to death
about ’er and yow’ve been hiding her all the sodding time. Who d’yow think yow are? You get ’er out ’ere – now!’

  ‘Hey, you!’ Dolly came striding over like a steamboat at full speed, magnificently large with child. Her wavy dark hair was all hanging loose as she had been in the process of brushing it out, which made her look younger and rather wild. ‘Who’re you talking to like that? Our Rachel’s been looking after your babby when you and that feller of yours are too kalied or idle to bother – you should be thanking ’er, not shooting yer mouth off!’

  Irene, already in the wrong and faced by two furious women with their arms folded, could see she was beaten.

  ‘All right – well, now you’ve got my daughter you can cowing well give ’er back!’

  ‘She’s asleep,’ Rachel said. ‘And that’s the best place for her. How much sleep did you think she was going to get sat out on the step all night with next to nothing on? You’re a lousy mother, Irene – your kids’d be better off in a home than with you, the way you carry on.’

  She hadn’t really meant to say that, but she was tired and overwrought.

  ‘Oh-ho!’ Irene drew herself up, relishing the insult she was about to deliver. ‘My kids ought to be in a home? My kids’re all right. It’s that halfwit babby of yours should be shut away in a home – with all the other cripples.’

  Rachel had no idea she was going to do it. She just found herself launching her whole weight at Irene, her knuckles smashing into Irene’s cheek, her other hand coming up and slapping her face the other side. The pain from the punch jarred all down her arm, but she didn’t care. In fact it felt glorious! Irene screeched and Rachel felt her head jerked agonizingly to one side as Irene grabbed handfuls of her hair and yanked on it with full force. Rachel went mad – she was screaming, lunging at Irene with her nails, her fists, feeling blows landing on her as both of them yelled and flailed at each other. Rachel barely even knew where she was – she was full of crazed energy, a mass of kicking and hitting limbs, like a whirlwind with fists.