Starshine

by John Wilcox

Hickman eased a sigh. ‘Has anyone moved into Mr Murphy’s house?’

  ‘No. There’s been no time, since his death.’

  ‘Any idea of the rent?’

  ‘I think it’s about seven bob a week.’

  ‘They tell me that I’m getting my old job back. I could afford that. What do you say?’

  ‘Well it sounds as though that’s the nearest I’m going to get to a formal proposal, so I say let’s grab it.’

  They held hands across the table again, grinning at each other. Then Jim said, ‘I’ve got fourteen days before I go back to the barracks to be officially demobbed. I don’t suppose you would fancy Malvern again, would you?’

  Polly held up her hands in mock horror. ‘What! Out of wedlock? What sort of girl do you think I am?’ Then, ‘As a matter of fact, I’ve booked it for a week from Saturday.’

  Jim grinned. ‘Ah. Now I know exactly what sort of girl you are.’

  They were married in January of 1919 with Sergeant Martin Burgess as best man. They took a brief winter’s honeymoon – in Malvern, of course – and their daughter, Beatrice (the nearest female name they could find to Bertram) was born exactly nine months later. Despite all their efforts, she was their only child but she was a feisty schoolgirl who grew up to be a beautiful young woman, with red hair (‘How appropriate,’ said Jim, glaring in mock suspicion at his wife) and Polly’s green eyes.

  When Jim’s parents died they moved into their house at number 66 because it gave them a rather larger garden and room to build onto the back. Jim’s career prospered in the jewellery trade until the slump of the thirties propelled him out of work, forcing him to buy an insurance ‘book’, collecting on penny policies, but he sold it later at a small profit and bought a small wine outlet in Aston, where he indulged himself in his new interest in French vintages. His long war and his DCM and MM had made him something of a local hero, and he and Polly – a distinguished, good-looking couple in middle and old age – became honoured fixtures at British Legion functions. In the late thirties, Jim was elected president of the local branch.

  Their happiness was only blighted by the early death of Beatrice and then, tragically, that of her husband, and their three spirited daughters were brought up by Polly and Jim.

  The couple made one pilgrimage to Bertie’s grave in 1928. Father Picard had long since died but he had kept his word – without asking Jim for further payments – and a fine headstone, proudly carved, stood at the end of the grave under the lilac tree, now in colourful flower. The white stone stood out rather brashly from the old tombs and stones that stood around it but the couple were satisfied that it was well kept and they left a large wreath of red poppies on the grave. They also met the French lady, now in her late thirties, who had promised to maintain the grave. She had also kept her word, for the grave itself was well preserved, with fresh daffodils in an urn at its foot. Jim tried to give her a one hundred franc note but she indignantly refused. It was an honour, she said, to ‘do her duty to the fallen’.

  Jim was forty-three when the Second World War broke out and, although he volunteered to rejoin the Royal Warwickshire Regiment, his old wounds in leg and shoulder, together with his age, precluded him. He did, however, join the Home Guard, becoming a company commander – ‘a bloody officer at last,’ he crowed – and served out the war without firing a shot in anger.

  The three girls all married, had their own children and left Aston, although Polly and Jim stayed at number 66, Turners Lane with Jim’s treasured collection of French clarets. Polly died at the age of eighty in 1976, leaving Jim with his memories of a wonderful love, the occasional bad dream, as a relic of the Salient, and, in his later years, a determined mission.

  EPILOGUE

  Aston, Birmingham, August 1996

  The whole street knew that this was a special day. Shortly after the milk was delivered, the buzz developed from house to house along the terrace. Front doors were opened and, despite the chill of the morning, left open for minutes as aproned housewives, most of them with dark faces more redolent of Islamabad than Birmingham, stood and chatted. Occasionally, someone would nod towards number 66, where faded bunting was draped across the dark brick, hanging like forgotten detritus of the jubilee of 1977. Later, people hurrying to work paused to direct a quick look and a smile at the house’s curtained windows. Cars pulled out from the ranks that lined the pavements and sounded their horns as they passed. But here, at the epicentre of all the fuss, nothing seemed to be happening. The house stayed silent.

  Until, that is, The Telegram arrived. As soon as the post office van pulled up and the postman, in his yellow traffic surcoat, sprang out and knocked on the door, a small semicircle of neighbours materialised and gathered around him. The middle-aged woman who opened the door and took the envelope from him grinned and waved it in the air.

  ‘I expect it’s from ’er,’ she said. ‘’E ought to open it, then I’ll come out and read it to you. That is, if ’e’ll let me. You know what ’e’s like. ’E don’t want no fuss.’

  The gathering nodded in appreciation. That was as it should be. A hero should be modest.

  Once back inside, the woman pulled back the curtains on the parlour window that fronted the street and shouted up the stairs, ‘Telegram for you, Grandpops. Time to get up anyway. Lots to do today. Come on. Get out on parade. The car will be ’ere in just over an hour. Show a leg, love.’

  A querulous but loud reply came from up above. ‘Bugger it, gel. I’m up. Just going to the bathroom. That thing can wait.’

  Shaking her head in mock exasperation, Linda Grantham put the telegram on the table and hurried to the kitchen to put the kettle on. Then she laid the table with cornflakes, orange juice, bowls, knives and spoons. No cooked breakfast this morning, for by the time ex-Sergeant Major Jim Hickman, DCM, MM, lowered himself down that narrow wooden staircase, the bloody car would be here waiting. Well, let it wait! This was his day. He shouldn’t be bullied. Mind you, it was just as well she’d packed his overnight bag last night. There was no way the poor old love could hurry these days.

  The doorbell rang again and she opened it to admit her two younger sisters, Lilly and Amy, also plumply middle-aged. They all kissed quickly and Linda waved to the little knot of neighbours still gathered outside. ‘Sorry,’ she called. ‘’E’s still not seen it. So don’t ’ang about. I suppose it always says the same thing, anyway.’

  ‘Yes, but it’s a great thing to have a telegram from the Queen,’ said Mrs Patel from number 70, flashing her teeth in a wrap-around smile. ‘Perhaps we could see it when he’s gone?’

  ‘Okay,’ Linda nodded affably. ‘We’re off in about three-quarters of an hour. One of the girls will show it to you.’

  Inside, Lilly and Amy had gathered at the bottom of the stairs. ‘Happy birthday, Grandpops,’ they called up in unison. Then Amy shouted, ‘What’s it like to be a hundred?’

  ‘Bloody awful. Mind out. I’m coming down. Don’t want to fall on the pair of you.’

  Linda carefully laid out her grandfather’s pills on the kitchen table as she listened to each heavy but faltering step on the stairs. At last he appeared at the kitchen doorway with his other two granddaughters. The three gathered together and kissed him in turn.

  ‘What sort of night did you have, love?’ asked Amy.

  ‘Can’t grumble.’

  ‘No. You never do.’ Linda gave him a second hug, pulled back and with her handkerchief removed a tiny scrap of shaving soap from below his right ear. Then she looked him up and down. Her grandfather was still a tall man with broad shoulders but he stooped heavily now and his hair was reduced to a few grey strands, carefully combed back. His face was long and thin and, despite the jowls, retained the regularity of features that had drawn comparison with Gary Cooper years before. Linda looked approvingly into eyes that were as brown and gentle as her own.

  ‘You’ll do, Grandpa. Now, sit down and eat. It’s going to be a long day. Oh, and for goodness’ sake open your telegram. The ne
ighbours want to know what it says.’

  Hickman removed his glasses, gave the lenses a slow histrionic polish, replaced them and read aloud: ‘Hello, Jim boy. Are you up for a bit of bonking tonight? It’s convenient because Phil’s away. Let me know. All love, Liz.’

  A howl went up from the girls. ‘Oh, Granddad, really!’ Linda snatched the telegram away, read it and passed it round. ‘It’s very nice of her to send you birthday greetings. She must ’ave quite a bit to do without thinking of you.’

  ‘She didn’t. You told her.’ From under lowered brows, Jim’s eyes twinkled up at her in thanks.

  Linda gave the telegram to Lilly. ‘Be a good girl and show the bloody thing to his groupies outside, or they’ll be there all day. I’ll go and get our things. The car will be here soon.’

  Jim swallowed his pills with the orange juice but didn’t linger long on his cornflakes, even though Linda had sliced banana on them, which he loved. He was not at all sure how he viewed this day, but it had been long in preparation and he wanted just to get on with it now. His hand trembled as he sipped his tea and shot a glance at the black and white picture of Polly on the mantelpiece. Taken when she was sixty, she still looked good. Those cheekbones always helped in photos. What, he wondered, would she make of all this fuss now? There was no merit in living so long. In fact, it was bloody inconvenient for all concerned. The girls should have been able to sell the house and split the money between them when they most needed it – when they were young and starting up in life with their own young families. But he had hung on long after Polly had gone – and, of course, Bertie.

  Ah well. He slurped his tea and blew his nose. He had said goodbye to the great-grandchildren last night and there had been all that fuss at the service last Sunday at Aston parish church, just by the Villa ground. Although today, of course, was the real anniversary of the start of the First World War, or the Great War as they used to call it until the other one came along. Funny that his birthday had coincided with the beginning of that bloody great mess. Ah well again. He pushed back the chair and rose unsteadily to his feet.

  ‘Hey, Lyn,’ he called up the stairs, ‘don’t you be carrying those bags down the stairs. The girls can do that. They’re younger than you.’

  ‘I’m doing it. Shan’t be a minute. Can you get your coat?’

  He tossed his head in annoyance. Of course he could get his bloody coat! He wasn’t that doddery. A car hooted outside. The thing had arrived and Lilly came bustling back. ‘Car’s here, love. I’ll get your overcoat.’

  ‘No, for goodness’ sake … oh, never mind, then.’

  Amy adjusted his tie. ‘I hope Lyn packed your passport. I had enough trouble organising it.’

  He sighed and inwardly smiled. Amy was just establishing the fact that she too had played her part in arranging the Great Day. She wanted a little credit. He gave her a kiss. It had been necessary to take out a passport for him, for this would be only the second time he had travelled abroad since 1918. ‘I’m sure she has, love,’ he said. ‘She’s packed everything else: fourteen pyjamas, twenty-seven shirts, seventeen pairs of shoes, three walking sticks and the fire irons.’

  He was interrupted by Lynda clumping down the stairs, her own bag under her arm and his on an extended handle, thumping down stair by stair behind her. Lilly held out his overcoat so that he could lower his arms through the sleeves. Amy wrapped a scarf around his neck and knotted it under his chin.

  ‘Come on, Robert Redford,’ called Lynda. ‘You’ll ’ave to fight your way through your fans outside.’

  The car had pulled up outside. It was a long, low, black, highly polished limousine and, Jim thought, had last been used for a funeral. Might as well park it round the corner and keep it handy for when his time came … but everyone was cheering. The driver held open the car door, sprang to attention and gave a smart salute.

  ‘Happy birthday and congratulations, Sarn’t Major,’ he said.

  ‘Oh, bloody ’ell,’ muttered Jim. He thought about telling the smart young man that you didn’t salute a sergeant major, then thought better of it. The knot of people outside number 66 had now swelled into a small crowd and someone began singing ‘Happy Birthday to You’. For a brief moment the mind of the old man leaning on his two sticks went back to a very different birthday when the song was sung to him as he lay against the side of a shell crater in the Salient. Then he raised one of his sticks and the crowd fell silent.

  ‘Very kind of you,’ he said. ‘I shall be giving out money on my return but will you kindly now disperse and go back to your work? The economy is in a bad enough way without you buggering it up further. So please go and put your shoulder to the wheel and your arses to the whatsits for the common good. Thank you very much.’

  ‘Oh, he’s always been such a wag,’ Mrs Patel confided to her neighbour. ‘Enjoy yourself, Jim,’ she called and waved her miniature Union Jack.

  Jim waved his stick again and stooped to get into the back of the limo. Then he straightened up suddenly, his face full of concern.

  ‘The letter,’ he cried. ‘My bloody letter. I can’t go without it.’

  ‘What letter, love?’ asked Linda.

  ‘The letter … you know … the one I had been waiting for. It’s important. The whole bloody point will be lost if I … You know, it’s that one that came for me from the Ministry of Defence.’

  ‘Well no, as a matter of bloody fact, I don’t. Where is it anyway and why is it so important?’

  ‘It’s … er … personal. I think it’s by the side of me bed. Get it, there’s a love.’

  ‘Oh, very well. Get in the car, then.’

  The driver, smart in his grey suit and matching cap with gleaming black peak, helped him into the car and Jim half lay back, his sticks thrust before him as he watched anxiously for Lynda. Eventually, she came, waving a buff-coloured envelope and sat, panting, next to him. She handed him the letter.

  ‘Is this it?’

  ‘Aye, lass. That’s it.’

  ‘Looks like an income tax demand to me.’

  ‘No, it isn’t. Why are you puffing so?’

  ‘Look, Grandpops, just because you can nip up and down them stairs like a two-year-old, doesn’t mean to say I can do it. I’m a fifty-three-year-old widow now, you know, and fat with it.’

  Jim smiled sourly. She had gained weight rapidly since the death of her husband three years before and moving in with Jim to look after him. She interpreted looking after him as ensuring that he ate the gargantuan meals she cooked for him and the result had had a markedly greater effect on her figure than his. Now, they waved their hands at the car window like royalty as the limo slowly drew away.

  ‘It’s Elmdon airport, isn’t it, miss?’ enquired the driver.

  Lynda looked at him sharply to detect any impertinent irony but the driver’s gaze in the mirror seemed innocent enough. ‘Yes, please,’ she said. ‘And it’s missus. You should get your eyes tested, young man.’

  He gave her a nod and a grin. She returned it and grasped her grandfather’s hand. ‘Mum and Nannie would have loved this, you know.’

  Jim nodded but did not reply. His eyes had suddenly become moist.

  Two hours later their aircraft touched down at Brussels. It had been his first flight – he and Polly had never needed an aeroplane to reach Bournemouth or Rhyl on their annual summer holiday – and he had spent the time with his eyes closed, trying not to think of the past. The next couple of days would be bad enough and he mustn’t get emotional. Neither Polly nor Bertie liked fuss.

  At the airport there was a long, black Renault waiting for them, flying a British Legion flag. ‘Sorry we couldn’t get a Rover or a Jag,’ explained the grey-haired Legion official who met them, ‘and I’m afraid that Legion funds don’t run to a Rolls.’

  Jim nodded but said nothing.

  ‘It’s good of you to take care of us so well,’ said Lynda hurriedly. ‘The Legion has been so good in arranging it all. We’re very grateful.’

>   ‘Oh, the least we could do. It’s an honour to have Sergeant Major Hickman with us.’ He held open the door. ‘Very few veterans left now, I’m afraid, only—’

  ‘Don’t call me sergeant major,’ Jim interrupted. ‘I haven’t been a warrant officer for nigh on eighty years. Me name’s Jim. Any Warwicks here?’

  ‘Sorry, Jim. No, I’m afraid not. There are only four others. Of course they get smaller every …’ His voice tailed away as he realised the solecism. ‘No. No Warwicks. A bit of a mixed bag, really.’

  They all climbed into the Renault. ‘What’s the plan, then, Mr … er …?’

  ‘Robinson, call me George. Well, it won’t take us long to drive to Ypres. Incidentally, the Belgians call it something else now, but it sounds roughly the same. The ceremony takes place every evening at five at the Menin Gate, of course, but on this anniversary it will be a bit longer. The mayor will be there, and Jim and the other four veterans, and there will be a few speeches in French and English. The British military attaché from Brussels will be on parade and lots of attention, of course, will be on the five of you – photographs, press interviews and such.’ He smiled. ‘You’re the senior chap there in terms of age and rank, Jim, so they will probably focus on you a fair bit.’

  Jim gave him a sharp look from under a white eyebrow. ‘Lot of fuss. I didn’t realise there’d be that much fuss.’

  Lynda turned on him. ‘Oh, come on, Grandpops. You knew what was involved. Don’t be grumpy about it. It’s a great honour.’

  ‘Humph!’ Jim immediately felt guilty. ‘Sorry … er … George. It’s just that …’ His voice tailed away, then grew stronger. ‘It’s okay about tomorrow, isn’t it?’

  ‘Ah yes. You want to go to, where was it again?’

  ‘Place called Oostbeke. Can’t remember where it was ’cos I went by train, but it was our old Divisional HQ.’

  ‘Ah, yes. You can keep the car, of course, and the driver will know where it is. Now, about tonight ….’