Durham Trilogy 02. The Darkening Skies

by Janet MacLeod Trotter

  Sara smiled ruefully to herself, admitting a fleeting envy for the crinkled, month-old-baby who held Joe’s attention.

  Rosa blushed with pleasure and made him relinquish her daughter. ‘She needs feeding,’ she said, and disappeared into the bedroom. Talk of food sent Anna bustling to the larder to see what she could give her son while the Ritsons said their farewells.

  Sara and Joe looked at each other in frustration at such a tantalisingly brief reunion.

  ‘I’ll see you out,’ Joe said quickly and took Sara’s hand in the dark of the stairwell. Sam and Louie and Raymond walked ahead briskly, giving them a brief moment alone.

  ‘I miss you,’ Sara whispered as they kissed hungrily.

  ‘I think of you all the time,’ Joe sighed, nuzzling her neck.

  ‘Good…’ Sara smiled and they kissed again.

  ‘You’re a brave lass, sticking up for us - some people won’t like you for it,’ Joe became serious.

  ‘The louts that did this to your family aren’t worth the time of day, any road,’ Sara answered stoutly, ‘I’m not afraid of helping your family.’

  Joe pulled her to him and kissed her fiercely in reply. Sara managed to croak a goodbye and fled before Joe could see her cry. He watched her hurry after Louie and Raymond as the pale pink light of dawn caught the glint of gold in her hair and felt an aching emptiness.

  A week later the Dimarcos received the briefest of notes from Arturo to say they were being held in an old cotton mill in Lancashire along with hundreds of other Italians. ‘Davide is here and cousin Benito,’ Rosa read out, ‘and we are well. We do not know where we go next.’

  She looked at her mother. ‘That’s all it says. At least Uncle Davide is with them too. It’s not so bad if they’re all together.’

  Anna bit back the thousand questions that rushed in to her head. What did they sleep on? Did they eat? Where would they take them? When, oh God, would they see them again? Instead, she led her family down the road to St Teresa’s, holding her head high as some people ducked to avoid speaking and there they lit candles for their loved ones and prayed for their release.

  They returned to find Bobby crying in the backyard, huddled on the bench where Granny Maria used to sun herself next to the pots of plants.

  ‘Why are you not at school?’ Anna asked her youngest son sharply.

  ‘I - I h-hate it,’ he sobbed and buried his head further between his knees.

  ‘Nonsense.’ She shook his shoulders. ‘It’s important you learn your lessons. What will Papa say when he comes home?’

  ‘He’s not coming home,’ Bobby wailed, raising a blotchy face. ‘The lads at school say he’s been shot by a firing squad as a tr-traitor!’

  ‘What have they done to your face?’ Anna exclaimed, her fingers reaching quickly to touch the puffy bruising around his left eye. ‘Who did this?’

  ‘The Gateshead lads,’ Bobby mumbled, wincing at the contact. ‘They all hate me and I’m not going back. I’m never going back!’

  ‘Roberto, Roberto…’ his mother hugged her youngest to her, stroking his hair to calm him. ‘They are wicked to say such things. Of course your father has not been shot - we had a letter from him this morning. He’s living in a big place with Paolo and Uncle Davide and cousin Benito and lots of other Italians. He’s quite safe - the British are not going to hurt them.’

  ‘Then why have they taken them away?’ the boy asked her miserably.

  ‘It’s difficult to explain,’ Anna sighed, wondering herself what the answer was. ‘They are suspicious of us because we are Italians and Italy is at war with Britain. But when they discover that your papa and Paolo are good men, they will let them come home.’

  ‘So they won’t come back for us, then?’ Bobby asked, sliding her a cautious look. ‘The lads said we would be next.’

  Anna curbed her anger at such childish cruelty. ‘No, we will stay here, this is our home,’ Anna reassured. ‘And we must try and get the shop open again. You are the man of the house now, Bobby,’ she encouraged, ‘so you must be very brave and help us all you can.’

  Anna did not force her son back to school and, when he stayed away for the rest of term, no one made a fuss as attention turned to the swiftness of Nazi victories abroad. France made an armistice with Germany and Britain braced itself for invasion. Hilda, resigned to not seeing her captured husband Wilfred indefinitely, volunteered for the antiaircraft service and went off to train. Bombing raids on the east coast of England began and the local newspapers reported night attacks on Sunderland on the 18th and 21st of June.

  Anna, wondering about the safety of her sister-in-law Elvira and her family in Sunderland, asked Rosa to write a letter. But on the day it was posted, Elvira and her plump daughter Albina arrived on an overcrowded bus, clutching what belongings they could carry.

  Elvira was aghast at the wrecked parlour, the coloured glass gone from the wooden booths, the marble tables cracked and the windows still boarded up.

  ‘Our shop is untouched,’ Elvira told Anna, spreading her tiny hands in amazement. ‘We had no trouble until they came for Davide and Benito.’ She gulped back tears, worry lines creasing her bird-like face. ‘The policeman was very polite -he had a cup of tea and a sandwich and said it was just a formality. Then he took them away and we haven’t seen them since …’

  Anna handed Elvira her handkerchief and she blew her nose.

  ‘At least they are all safe,’ Anna comforted. ‘And Val?’

  ‘She is still training. We managed to get word to her and she came before we left - collected some of her things.’

  ‘Well, you must stay with us while this bombing continues,’ Anna insisted, ‘I’m glad you decided to come.’

  Albina said petulantly, ‘We had no choice. It wasn’t because of the bombing we came - we were told to leave.’

  Anna looked at her perplexed. “What do you mean, Albina?’

  Elvira held up her hand to silence her youngest daughter. ‘It’s for security reasons - the place we live - what they call it, Albina?’

  ‘A restricted zone,’ the girl replied, eyeing Rosa and her new baby with distaste.

  ‘So we are not allowed to stay,’ Elvira said, shrinking in to her chair. ‘We board up the shop and come here. What else can we do, Anna?’

  Anna hid her dismay. Elvira and Albina might not be able to go back to Sunderland for months and in the meantime they had two extra mouths to feed. Somehow they must start selling food again, though she had little idea how to go about ordering supplies; that was something Arturo and Paolo had always done.

  She stretched out a hand and patted her sister-in-law’s arm. ‘Of course you did the right thing. We will help each other, Elvira, and show our husbands we can be strong.’

  The Fall of France brought production at the Eleanor and Beatrice pits grinding to a halt, as the demand for Durham coal in the French steel industry was severed by the occupying Germans and scores of men were laid off, confused and angry after their strenuous efforts of the past few months to dig out coal as fast as they could. Haunted by the spectre of the Great Depression, union men like Sam Ritson beseeched the other coalfields to share their production quotas with the Durham pitmen who seemed hardest hit, but the other mine owners would not help.

  ‘The lads can’t even go and work elsewhere,’ Sam railed at home.

  ‘Perhaps Raymond could get a job in munitions?’ Louie suggested, worried that their nephew was hanging around the streets, idle.

  ‘He can’t, Louie!’ Sam lost his patience. ‘There’s a law against pitmen going into other trades - they made it when the government couldn’t get enough coal - now we’re stuck with nothing to do.’

  Sara was uneasy at the rising tension in the Ritson household. Young Stan was waking them all at night with nightmares that his home on Tyneside was on fire from falling bombs and Louie had allowed him to move in to the parlour to sleep with her and Sam. Jacob was growing increasingly frail and, since the bitter row over Hilda’s
wedding, he had become a crotchety old man, awkward about his food. Uninterested in venturing from the house, he no longer went for his customary walks or even to read at the Institute. When the air-raid sirens went Jacob refused to leave his bed, declaring the Hun would not chase him in to the cold in his nightshirt and, if his time had come, it was the Lord’s will not the Germans’.

  Sara worried about Louie trying to keep the peace among her fractious menfolk and feared that, with nothing to do, Raymond might fall in with bad company again. But she knew that her wages from Sergeant’s were a welcome supplement to Louie’s small income and suspected Louie was grateful for the company of another woman in her house of bad-tempered men, especially as she missed Hilda’s cheerful visits. Yet her overriding concern was for the abandoned Dimarco women and their children.

  Sara gathered from Rosa that the strain of not knowing the fate of their men was compounded by arguments between Albina and Sylvia who could not agree about anything.

  ‘For once Sylvia is taking my side,’ Rosa told her wryly. ‘Albina is driving her mad. She gets up late and won’t help around the house and she shouts at the children. It’s terrible.’

  ‘At least your mother’s got the shop open again,’ Sara said, trying to cheer her friend.

  ‘But hardly anybody comes,’ Rosa frowned. ‘Just the bairns for sweets - and we’re running out of them. Mam doesn’t know where to get stuff from and none of the travellers have been here since…’

  Sara realised that the morale of Rosa and the other women would only be lifted by positive news of the arrested men. Talking it over with Sam and Louie that evening after Jacob and Stan had gone to bed, Louie made a suggestion.

  ‘Eb and Miss Eleanor might be able to do something.’

  Sam gave Louie a critical look, not liking the way she still spoke of Eb’s wife with the deference given to the upper classes. ‘What could Eleanor do?’ he asked pointedly.

  ‘Miss Eleanor’s our county councillor,’ she said, ‘and she’s well connected. Perhaps she could make enquiries.’

  ‘Anything’s worth a try,’ Sara said quickly. ‘Could we go and see her?’

  Sam and Louie looked at each other.

  ‘She comes to Whitton a couple of times a week, doesn’t she?’ Sam queried.

  ‘Aye,’ Louie nodded. ‘She still visits the mothers’ clinic she started in South Street. We could call there tomorrow.’

  Louie and Sara went to the baby clinic the following day in Sara’s lunch hour but Eleanor Kirkup was not there. However, returning the day after, they found her in a small office above the main clinic at the top of a steep, dingy stairway. In contrast, the room was white-washed and brightly lit, with comfortable chairs covered in floral patterns. The councillor looked up as they entered, her slim, serious face breaking into a pleasant smile.

  She rose. ‘Louie, how wonderful to see you! Please sit down and I’ll get us a cup of tea. And it’s Sara, isn’t it?’ she asked. Sara nodded, pleased to have been remembered by this woman of importance.

  ‘We don’t need a cuppa,’ Louie protested, uneasy at the fuss being made.

  ‘There’s always one on the go at your house, Louie,’ Eleanor waved a pale bony hand, ‘just sit down and I won’t be a minute.’

  Sara watched her cross the room, her movements graceful and unhurried, her clothes plain but elegant. At Hilda’s wedding, Sara had thought Eleanor Kirkup quite middle-aged and a bit severe, but here she seemed relaxed and her face younger under the page-boy hairstyle, especially when she smiled. Her face bore no trace of make-up and the way she looked with her dark eyes was direct and interested.

  She helped them to tea from a china pot while Louie told her the family news.

  ‘But it’s Sara’s Italian friends we’ve come about,’ Louie cut short the pleasantries. ‘We wondered if you’d be able to find out what’s happening to them?’

  Eleanor blew on to her black tea and considered. ‘Give me what details you know about the men and I’ll see what I can do,’ she promised. ‘I’ve seen what’s been done to the shop - dreadful,’ she shuddered. ‘War brings out the worst in some of us.’

  ‘And the best,’ Louie countered. ‘Look at our Hildy on an ack-ack gun, not knowing if she’ll see Wilfred again but just getting on with it. And Eb, of course, getting his medal for bravery in the Great War.’

  ‘That experience changed your brother’s mind about war, Louie,’ Eleanor said adamantly ‘He’s a registered conscientious objector now.’

  ‘Well he’s done his bit for his country,’ Louie said, feeling uncomfortable. She stood up and Sara followed.

  ‘Thank you very much, Mrs Kirkup,’ Sara smiled gratefully and took the thin hand Eleanor offered. It was warm in spite of the woman’s pallid, fragile appearance.

  ‘I’ll do my best, Sara,’ she smiled back. ‘Come and visit us soon, Louie,’ she urged, ‘Eb and Rupert would so love to see you - and you can meet our Belgian refugees. They’ll be with us till this ghastly war is over, I suspect.’

  ‘Thanks.’ Louie blushed as Eleanor kissed her on the cheek, but Sara doubted Louie would go to Durham. However much she yearned to see her brother and nephew, Sara knew that old Jacob Kirkup held too much sway over Louie. While he lived her loyalty lay with her father first.

  Arturo rose stiffly from his straw palliasse, damp from the rain that had gusted in through the gaping windows opposite, and shivered. Paolo lay next to him, huddled in a childlike position, managing to sleep. He felt a wave of affection for his eldest son, uncomplaining throughout their ordeal. It was Paolo who raised his spirits when all seemed bleak and calmed his temper when they were taken for endless questioning.

  Arturo looked around him at the scores of figures sighing in their sleep or sitting in hunched groups, unable to rest on the cold, pitted factory floor with its rank smell of machine grease and blocked drains. In his walks around the derelict mill, queuing for water at one of the few taps or trying to exchange possessions for a packet of cigarettes from the guards, he had met dozens of the incarcerated Italians; Northerners and Southerners, cafe owners and shop workers, musicians and artists, boys of seventeen and men in their sixties. Most were as confused and anxious as he was and their unease had not been lessened by the rumour that the Commandant had a list of dangerous fascists marked for deportation.

  Arturo recalled his last interview with a stony-faced man in a smart suit, who reeled off his name, age, occupation and where he was born in Italy.

  ‘You seem to know all about me already,’ Arturo had quipped.

  The man looked at him with hostility. ‘You are a member of the fascio in Sunderland?’

  ‘I am a member,’ Arturo shrugged. ‘I have a tiny piece of land near Cassino and so I pay my tax through the fascio, 2/6d a year—’

  He was interrupted. ‘Your brother Davide Dimarco is an active member of the fascist club, is he not?’

  ‘Davide? Well yes, but it’s not what you think — the fascio is - what you say? - a social club.’

  ‘Your daughter Domenica married a Pasquale Perella in July of last year. The Perellas are known fascists. Where is your daughter now?’

  Arturo gawped at the man. As far as he knew, the Perellas had no political leanings; apart from a natural patriotism towards Italy, they were prosperous business people who had returned home in order to keep the family together.

  ‘She is in Italy,’ Arturo replied nervously.

  ‘Have you heard from her since her return?’

  ‘A couple of times.’

  ‘And your son-in-law? What is he doing now?’ The voice was hard, the eyes already held him guilty.

  ‘I think he is in the army. Naturally he would have been called up on his return—’

  ‘That will be all,’ his interrogator dismissed him.

  Afterwards Arturo had berated himself for not mentioning his part in the Great War when Italy and Britain had fought together. Unable to get home to join up, he had volunteered with the DLI and been o
ffered naturalisation at the end of the war. Why had he not taken it? he cursed now. Because he had been proud of being Italian; they could strip him of his livelihood and rob him of possessions, but he still had his pride in his family and his people.

  He thought of them now as he straightened out his crumpled clothes and went to wash. How would they manage without him and Paolo? he fretted. He agonised over the danger they might be in and how they would feed themselves. But at least the kindly Ritsons had offered to look after them and he must take comfort from that.

  For the umpteenth time he went over the events of that last horrifying night in Whitton Grange, the rioting and looting and then the arrests. It came to him, suddenly, as he splashed the trickle of cold water from the ancient tap on to his unshaven face; Signor Turnbull must have supplied the information on his family. He was the only one in authority who knew such details about them all. Arturo gave a howl of anger to think how the policeman had infiltrated his family, been welcomed in with open arms, only to betray them. How could he trust any of them again?

  The man queuing behind Arturo put a hand on his shoulder to see if he was all right. Arturo turned his haggard face and stared in disbelief at the familiar figure.

  ‘Gino?’ he gasped. ‘Gino.’

  ‘Arturo?’ his brother cried. ‘You old bastard!’

  They threw their arms around each other in delight.

  Sara came home from work to find a surprise visitor sitting in Louie’s kitchen. Her mother rose to greet her with a hug of affection.

  ‘Oh, Mam! It’s so good to see you. But why didn’t you say you were coming?’ Sara reproached. ‘I would have met you.’ Her face shadowed. ‘It’s not bad news is it? Is Tom…?’

  ‘Tom’s here,’ her mother broke the news. ‘He got a message to Uncle Alfred to say he’s at the army hospital - up at The Grange.’