by Joy Dettman
She found the train going to the station near the boarding house. A middle-aged woman helped lift the stroller on board, a man helped lift it off. Where there is a will there is a way. She sat the case in the stroller and Jimmy on the case, looped the string bag over the handle, and pushed the whole lot the few blocks to the boarding house.
She’d barely knocked on the rent hatch before it slid open. ‘My ticket home was cancelled, Mrs Norris. Tuesday is the earliest I can get south. I was hoping . . .’
‘You poor dears. Come around to my private door,’ Myrtle Norris said.
PRIORITIES
Gertrude would be expecting them on Monday. Maisy had offered to meet the train and drive them home. They had to be told. Mrs Norris, who had a telephone in her parlour, offered to call Jenny’s family. Jenny gave her Maisy’s number and a pound note to pay for the call and lodgings for three more nights.
So strange to enter number five alone, to sit on that bed to imagine the telephone conversation below, Maisy’s strident telephone voice infiltrating that la-di-da parlour. A strange weekend, lonely, Jimmy looking for his father, sad too, knowing he’d forget his daddy before Jim came home.
On Monday, she went early to the local station to rebook her seat south. And of course she’d left it too late. Everyone with cancelled seats on Saturday had rebooked for Tuesday. She could get a seat on Friday’s train south, which would mean getting into Melbourne on Saturday then having to wait there all day Sunday.
‘What about Saturday?’
‘Nope.’
Everyone wanted to travel at the weekend. She booked for the following Monday, then went shopping for bread, milk, apples, two bananas, a bag of oatmeal and half a dozen eggs — which were probably stale. She bought a wedge of cheese. There was lard in the fridge, a scrape of butter. She kept herself busy that morning, sorting through the things she had to do. Maisy would have to be contacted again. How long did it take for a letter to travel interstate? She bought a writing pad, a cheap pen, a bottle of ink, bought a Sydney newspaper, then called into the post office to buy a couple of stamps.
There were four telephone cubby holes in a small room near the post office entrance; two were in use. She knew Maisy’s number but didn’t know how to make a phone call. The stroller parked in front of a vacant telephone she read the instructions, found the slots for coins, counted her coins.
‘We’re not dumb, are we?’ she said. ‘Daddy did it, didn’t he?’
‘N-dudda,’ Jimmy agreed.
So they did it; and it was so easy — except Maisy didn’t answer the phone, Jessie did. But that was fine too; distance and Jimmy made it easier to fill the three minutes allocated by the telephone company, and on the telephone, Jessie sounded just like Maisy.
She’d have to pay Mrs Norris a week’s rent. She had plenty of money; Jim had given her money to get home, and she still had some of what he’d sent her to buy her ticket to Sydney in the first place — and Wilfred Whiteford’s three ten-shilling notes. She took them from the envelope, added them to her total and slid them into the money pocket of her handbag. She looked at the envelope then, at what had to be a telephone number.
During business hours. Your beautiful voice was appreciated. Wilfred Whiteford.
She’d dreamt she was singing with a band last night, singing on the Woody Creek stage in Sissy’s rainbow taffeta evening gown. All day that dream had been like an itch in her mind. She wanted so badly to scratch it. There was no harm in calling that number. He probably wouldn’t even be there.
She’d need pennies to make a local call. She had plenty of pennies.
So she did it.
30 September 1942
Dear Jim,
All my life, trains and me have been joined. My ticket south was cancelled on Saturday. I was buying a ticket back to the boarding house when I found the envelope that old pianist from the club gave me when he brought my handbag out. In the dark, I thought it was my talent quest envelope, but it wasn’t. It had his name on it and his business phone number.
I know this probably will sound crazy to you — it still does to me — but it seemed like fate, because when I went down to rebook my seat, I couldn’t get one until next Monday, so I rang the number on the envelope.
His name is Wilfred Whiteford and he works in some government department in the city, and he must have an important job because he’s got a telephone on his desk. Anyway, he told me that he donates his time at that club every Friday night, to do his bit for the war effort, but he also plays with a drummer and a sax player at parties and dances, and they get paid to play. His friend, Andy, used to sing with his band until he broke his hip and Mr Whiteford said they need a singer.
I love singing, and I’ve hardly opened my mouth in years. When I go home I’ll never open it again. I’m stuck here because of the trains until Monday, so I told him I’d go to the club this Friday.
He’s got a car, and if this isn’t fate, then nothing in the entire world is, because he lives with his friend on that hill we could see from the boarding house window, which is only a mile or two away, and he said he’d pick me up and see me home and to tell my husband that he’ll take good care of me.
I spoke to Mrs Collins, and she said she’d be happy to keep an eye on Jimmy. Then I told Mrs Norris, and the end result of that is they are going to share the keeping of an eye on him. He won’t move anyway.
The landlady has been very thoughtful to us and is not half as stuck up since we came running back to her in a panic. I was scared she’d give me the ‘no kids’ policy again, but she asked us into her private rooms and made me a cup of tea, and even offered to call Maisy.
Also, I found that bankbook you hid in my case. I didn’t know you’d put money in it, you drongo. You’d already spent far too much on me, but thanks very much anyway. I won’t use it, but knowing that it’s in there makes me feel safe.
Jimmy did a little run of three steps yesterday. Georgie walked at nine months. Margot didn’t until she was eighteen months old.
Love,
Jenny and Jimmy xxx X That one is from Jimmy.
She was midway through writing to Gertrude when the landlady delivered two envelopes to her door, one addressed to Mrs Jim Hooper, the second to Miss Jennifer Morrison or Hooper.
When she’d phoned, Mrs Norris had given Maisy the boarding house address.
29 September
Dear Jennifer,
Did you go and marry that boy . . .
Dear Jenny,
Your landlady sounds like a Lorna Hooper attempting to talk around a mouthful of marbles, but seems nicer. She said she was making the call for Mrs Jennifer Hooper and Jessie and the girls are all busting to know if you got married to Jim, or if your landlady just thinks you did . . .
Dear Granny,
No, I didn’t marry him, but I wish I had. I’ll probably be home before you get this, unless they cancel my ticket again, but I was going to write it before I got your letter, so I’m writing it, because you won’t believe what’s happened up here.
Jim took me to a club on the Friday before he left and the landlady and a schoolteacher kept an eye on Jimmy, who was sound asleep. Anyway, I ended up singing and the pianist at the club offered me a job singing with his band. As I’m stuck up here until next Monday, I told him I’d sing again this Friday. He is very respectable, his name is Wilfred Whiteford, he’s almost as old as you, he works in some government department and he’s picking me up at the door and driving me home.
You missed out on seeing Jimmy take his first steps. He took off the morning Jim left, and he thinks he’s so smart — and he’s saying dada. Jim taught him, just said it over and over and over until Jimmy started saying it back.
I won’t start another page. I could fill it with what we’ve been doing, but I’ll tell you all about it next week.
Love,
Jenny and Jimmy
Dear Jen,
I don’t know where this will find you, or when it will find you, but
I gave Pops’ address when we booked in, so if you’ve gone home, the landlady will send it on to you.
It’s hard to know where to start or CENSORED the chaps say. I don’t know how much is fact and how much myth. We’re supposed to CENSORED. CENSORED or so they said. It sort of CENSORED . . .
Dear Jim,
Your letter looked as if it had been under attack by Japs, or maybe the Yanks got at it. They pretty much left the last line intact . . .
Dear Granny,
I hope you’re sitting down. If you’re not, then sit down, because I just cancelled my seat on Monday and paid Mrs Norris a month’s rent in advance, most of it from money I earned from singing.
I could say that I’m sorry, but that would be a lie, because I’m not the slightest bit sorry. I’m floating on cloud nine this morning and from up where I am, the whole world looks technicolour.
You should see where we are living. It’s got leadlight windows in the front and hot water pouring out of taps, two indoor lavs, one upstairs for the lodgers and one for Mrs Norris, plus an outside lav for the men. It’s got three bathrooms, including the landlady’s, and a gas stove in the kitchen, which I’ve had a few heart attacks lighting. I can’t light the gas oven, but one of the Miss Wilsons did it for me tonight and I made a batch of your oatmeal biscuits with bought walnuts.
Speaking of gas, which leads to the boiling of kettles . . . would you or Elsie please, please have a spare tea coupon? I’m reduced to stealing Mrs Collins’s used tea-leaves . . .
All letters to the boarding house were delivered to the one letterbox, sorted by the landlady then delivered, if the lodger was in. If not, she placed the letters in her letter rack on the rent hatch shelf in the lodgers’ kitchen. Jim and Maisy’s letters were addressed to Mrs J. Hooper, while Granny made a point of addressing hers to Jennifer Morrison — and Jenny wished they’d go astray.
26 October 1942
Dear Jenny,
You get yourself home here where you belong. The girls are missing you and so am I. I might not admit this to anyone else, but I’m not as young as I used to be and those two are a handful. What little I’ve seen of Sydney was enough to tell me that it was no place for a single girl. You get yourself home this week . . .
5 November 1942
Dear Granny,
You know and I know that Margot is more Elsie’s kid than mine, and I’ll bet she’s happier without me. I doubt Georgie is pining for me and I’ll bet you ten pounds that you only miss me on wash days — and I’ve got the dirty napkins up here with me . . .
It must have been the landlady’s husband who hadn’t liked kids. Jenny had barely set eyes on him, and when she had, she’d been more interested in watching Jim slap his head and click his heels. He’d looked twenty years younger than his wife, though maybe it was Mrs Norris’s weight and old-lady clothes that made her look sixty. Up close, her face looked younger, or maybe being with Jimmy made her younger. She was dotty about him — not that anyone could be blamed for that. Mrs Collins was dotty about him. Mr Fitzpatrick called him his young gentleman friend.
And they liked her, too. Mrs Collins popped in to ask her if she felt like a cup of tea some weekends, and if Jenny was in the kitchen when the teacher was making her evening meal, she always put enough tea in the pot for two. She wasn’t like a schoolteacher, more like a chatty little grandmother. She had an adult son and three grandchildren who she only saw during the school holidays. They lived in Melbourne.
The landlady wasn’t exactly normal, or chatty. She said a lot, but gave little away — like Norman. She never went out, other than to shop and go to church on Sundays. She had no visitors, had a pile of newspapers delivered and read them cover to cover, and every day, at any time of the day, the wireless was playing.
November 1942
Dear Granny,
For your information, I am not pregnant and trying to hide it from you. And no one has ever pined for me, so please stop trying to blackmail me home.
All I’ve done since I was fourteen is watch my belly blow up like a toad and wash napkins. I know most of it is my fault. I know I’m responsible for Georgie’s care, but aren’t I responsible for my own care too? You’re the only person in the world who has cared what happened to me. Can’t you be just a little bit happy for me? This is the first time in my life that I’m doing what I want to do, what I’ve always wanted to do. And I love what I’m doing. It’s like I’ve finally found out who I am up here.
And as for Jimmy being neglected, you can tell Vern Hooper from me that his grandson is living better up here than he’d ever live back there. Jimmy thinks home is a double storey brick house in a posh suburb. He thinks toast comes out of a toasting machine and hot water comes out of taps. You can tell Vern too that Jim was the one who got me singing again and he’s happy that I’m doing it, and while you are about it, tell him that We’re officially engaged, and as soon as I turn twenty-one I’m going to marry Jim. And on that note, I’ll close.
Love,
Jenny, waist measurement 24 inches.
PS I’m putting in ten bob for the girls which I made with my voice. Buy them something nice with it and tell them it’s from me and Jimmy.
November 1942
My dearest Jen and Jimmy,
I like picturing you in our room, seeing Jimmy bum up in his cot. It was our safe little island away from world wars and family wars, and knowing that you’re still up there lets me hold onto a bit of that time.
I suppose Jimmy is walking everywhere by now. I’ll never forget the last morning when he took that step then plopped down on his bare backside. I still laugh about it. The look on his face was just like Pops looks when something doesn’t turn out the way he expects it to.
He’s not happy about you being up there but at least he’s writing to me. I sent him one of the photos we had taken . . .
He wrote pages and pages. At times there were weeks between his letters, then two or three would come within a couple of days. She loved his letters, which, as long as he mentioned nothing about the war, the censor’s pen left unmarked. She wrote pages to him, wore her writing pad away with her letters to Jim.
. . . I feel as if I made some sort of a hop, step and jump from fourteen to almost nineteen, and I found you and Jimmy somewhere along the way. Wilfred Whiteford is like my new Mr Foster, more talkative, more modern, but just as kind. He drives a modern car that looks a bit like your father’s new car but doesn’t always go like a modern car. He mixed his petrol ration half and half with kerosene, but it gets us to where we have to go and gets us home again.
I’m learning so much from him, about B flats and C minors, about Sydney’s roads, and maps and all sorts of things . . .
There were gaps in Jenny’s education, which she put down to jumping from fourteen to almost nineteen, or living in limbo between those ages. She was back in the real world now and learning something new every day.
With Jim’s ring as her shield, she was even learning not to see every male under fifty as a potential rapist. She danced with a few at the club, even sang with a few. There were those who wanted to do more than dance but all she had to do was show them her ring and tell them her husband was fighting the Japs and seven out of ten ended up talking about their own girlfriends, their own wives and kids. Little Wilfred was her shield against the three out of ten who didn’t care if she, or they, were married or not.
She loved Friday nights at the clubs, loved her Saturday nights even more, when she sang with Wilfred and his band of merry men and was paid to be a professional singer, and was treated like a paid singer by the men who hired the band. She loved her life, loved every single day of it, and loved Jim for giving her back her life.
Most of what she earned went on food and rent, but she and Jimmy window-shopped and they didn’t need money at the public library, which was a king’s banquet of books. Like a starving child, she feasted there.
Clothing was a problem. Her only frock, fit to sing in, was her green linen,
and at a pinch her navy print. She wore her black skirt and sweater when the nights were cold, but Sydney in November was too hot for woollen skirts and sweaters.
The red dress taunted her every time she opened the wardrobe. On a Friday night in November she decided to wear it, with her red high-heeled sandals. One glance in the mirror told her it would get her more tips — and more trouble from the Yanks.
The lack of clothes would drive her home — and cheeky-faced little Georgie. She planned to be home for Christmas. The war could end soon. According to the wireless the Germans were retreating, or retreating in places.
The Japs weren’t.
The news was full of Japanese convoys, and the Solomon Islands and Guadalcanal.
‘Guadalcanal was attacked early yesterday morning by flying fortresses under General Kennedy’s command. One tail-gunner reported seeing Japanese soldiers crowded like sardines on the ship.’
‘How far away are the Solomon Islands, Mrs Collins?’
Mrs Collins usually knew the answers; she’d been teaching school and living at the boarding house since her husband died. And if she didn’t know, Miss Robertson, another teacher, who was from England, did. She’d gone on walking holidays through France and Germany as a girl. Sitting with them at night was like a geography lesson. Whether they knew it or not, they were educating Jenny.
‘Hitler is hurrying troops and planes from south Russia to Bulgaria and Greece. The Germans are commandeering all shipping lying in Greek harbours. Cairo reports that the Germans are being pounded by medium and heavy bombers. The Germans’ rearguard actions are pitifully small affairs as General Montgomery’s men pursue the remnants of Rommel’s ragged army . . .”
So many cities, in countries Jenny had barely heard of. She heard about them now and found them in the library’s huge world atlas.
‘My neighbour’s twin sons were fighting in Africa,’ she told Miss Robertson one night. It was the first time she’d managed to say ‘twin’ without following it with an internal stream of Bastard, bastard, bastard. They were still bastards, but distant bastards. She still dreamed of them, but they were no longer pursuing her. In one dream they were throwing grenades at the Germans which weren’t grenades but lemons. Mad dreams, but better — maybe because she loved their mother, who addressed her letters to Jennifer Hooper, and who never once attempted to blackmail her into coming home.
