by Jack Murray
‘Danny, this is Governess Curtis. She taught both myself and my wife, funnily enough.’
Danny shook hands with the lady.
‘Pleased to meet you, Danny. It always gladdens my heart when I see someone likes Shakespeare. I’m sure you’ll enjoy reading it.’
‘I will, Mrs Curtis,’ replied Danny.
Henry gently touched Danny’s arm and said, ‘Well, I think, Robert, you have a lesson now. Danny, let me walk you to the door.’
A few minutes later Danny was walking through the snow back to the forge clutching his book. His senses were filled by the memory of the warm hospitality of the Cavendish family, the enthusiasm of their son and the coldly beautiful green eyes of their daughter.
4
January 1939
‘Now, pick up the shoe and place it in the forge,’ said Stan to Robert Cavendish, ‘Yes, just there.’ The boy did as he was instructed. ‘Now release the shoe.’ The two of them stood back and looked at the shoe beginning to glow. Stan clapped a big hand on the shoulder of the young lord and said, ‘Your first shoe, well done, sir.’
‘Thank you, Mr Shaw,’ said Robert enthusiastically.
Danny walked in and looked at the boy’s handiwork. He gave the boy a nod and said, ‘Now, you have to do the tidying up bit.’
Robert did as he was told. By the end of the day, his enthusiasm and friendly nature had won over the family. Around five in the evening, Jane Cavendish stopped by the Shaw house to pick up the boy. Like Kate, she was in her mid-thirties, but she looked much younger.
Tall and willowy, she moved with a grace that would have had a prima ballerina crying in her beer. She was popular among the villagers for the principal reason that she was one of them. Far from being born with a silver spoon, she was the daughter of Bill Edmunds who was the former groundskeeper at Cavendish Hall. She had been the stable girl for the family but unbeknown to them had also been the sweetheart of the future Lord Cavendish, Henry. Against his mother’s wishes, Henry had married her as soon as both of them were of age.
‘Hello, Mrs Shaw,’ said Jane, knocking lightly on the open door.
‘Lady Cavendish,’ said Kate Shaw, turning around from the Aga.
‘Mummy,’ exclaimed Robert, leaping up from the table where he had been gorging himself on freshly made toasted bread. He ran into his mother’s arms and began to tell her everything that had happened that day.
‘Slow down,’ laughed Jane, rolling her eyes at Kate. ‘How was he?’
Danny appeared at the door and answered the question, ‘We’d happily take him on Lady Cavendish. Not sure we could afford his wages though.’
‘Can I come back, mummy?’ asked Robert.
‘Well that’s for Mr Shaw to decide, not me.’ Danny nodded and Robert looked pleadingly at his mother. Jane shrugged, ‘As long as it doesn’t interfere with your studies than, yes. I can see no problem.’
Robert let out a cheer and immediately ran over to hug Danny.
‘Are you sure, Danny?’ asked Jane, smiling.
‘He’s a good lad and a great help. He worked hard today, didn’t you?’ asked Danny looking down at the future Lord Cavendish.
Robert’s response was to begin a list of everything he had done, which, to be fair, was not insubstantial. He’d clearly had a ball.
‘Well, I hope you put as much effort into your studies,’ commented Jane sternly. She knew she had few worries on this score but felt the need to say something her parents might have said. Such is the way of things. She caught a look on Kate’s face and the two women smiled conspiratorially.
They walked out of the kitchen, and Danny accompanied them up the garden path.
‘Thank you,’ said Jane, and she meant it.
-
Over the next few months, Robert became a frequent, and welcome, visitor to the forge. Henry looked on in approval as he saw his son grow in stature. The time spent with the Shaw family had done wonders for the boy’s physical strength and confidence. From his own upbringing, Henry knew he would need reserves of both for when he was sent away from the Hall to boarding school. This was something he wasn’t looking forward to, but it was expected and probably necessary.
And so, summer gave way to autumn. The lambs grew bigger, the harvest was made ready and blossoms that had floated through the air became copper leaves, deserting the trees to be carried hither and thither in the wind; the days became shorter and darker and colder.
5
3rd September 1939
The Shaw family gathered around the wireless. The air was thick with fear and sadness. Kate’s eyes were milk wet as she waited to hear the inevitable news. An icy chill gripped her as she looked at her two boys. Both strong young men, but boys. One seventeen, the other twenty one. Their life was meant for other things, not this. What had happened to the world? The natural order of life was working in the village, falling in love, marriage. The family was being ripped apart by forces that Kate did not understand. Life was not meant to be this.
Neville Chamberlain’s reedy voice halted all thoughts. She listened to the words that she’d dreaded hearing for days, if not years. Stan stood up from the kitchen table and walked to his armchair, puffing on his pipe. Danny and Tom stared at the wireless, in a mixture of excitement and dread.
‘This morning,’ announced Chamberlain, ‘the British Ambassador in Berlin handed the German government a final note stating that, unless we heard from them by 11 o'clock that they were prepared at once to withdraw their troops from Poland, a state of war would exist between us. I have to tell you now that no such undertaking has been received, and that consequently this country is at war with Germany.’
Danny sat back from his hunched position. His senses tingled as he listened to the Prime Minister continue relaying the sombre news.
‘You may be engaged in work essential to the prosecution of war for the maintenance of the life of the people - in factories, in transport, in public utility concerns, or in the supply of other necessaries of life. If so, it is of vital importance that you should carry on with your jobs. Now may God bless you all. May He defend the right. It is the evil things that we shall be fighting against - brute force, bad faith, injustice, oppression and persecution - and against them I am certain that the right will prevail.’
The family looked at one another when Chamberlain had finished. They waited for Stan to say something. Instead, Stan remained silent, staring ahead with a stony countenance. Unreadable.
‘What does it mean for the boys, Stan?’ asked Kate, unable to hide the fear in her voice.
Stan thought for a moment and then said, ‘For the moment, nothing.’
‘For the moment,’ replied Kate fearfully. The answer hung in the air, like mustard gas. But Stan remained silent, lost in his own thoughts. He looked at his wife. His eyes were like sunken pits and she felt like crying. As young as he was, Danny could read his father’s mind.
‘It means we’re all on alert,’ said Danny. ‘If this Polish thing finishes well and Germany leaves, then we’re back to where we were. If they don’t leave and we commit troops then it’s a mess and it will not end quickly. I think we’ll have to deal with Hitler once and for all.’
He looked at his father as he said this and could see the sadness in a man who recognised, with all due sense of fear and dread, what the next few years would bring. At last Stan rose from his seat and trooped out of the kitchen and headed back towards the forge. The family watched him go. They looked at one another. Tom put a comforting arm around his mother but could find nothing to say.
-
Later that evening, Danny sat with a group of his friends in the centre of the village. All of the young men of the village were there. Normally such get-togethers were marked by fairly robust banter. However, the mood was solemn. Instead there was discussion about what they would do. A few of them had lost family during the Great War and there was an unspoken agreement that, amongst them, there would be no bellicose behaviour. The conversation
centred on one topic.
‘They’ll start calling us up in the new year, wait’ll you see,’ said Hugh Gissing with absolutely no evidence to back up this claim. But they knew he was right. It was just a question of when.
Danny was unusually quiet. His thoughts were scattered like the leaves on the ground. He felt an emptiness that he couldn’t be sure wasn’t fear. The certainties he’d felt as a child had slowly begun to erode over the last few years. War was a hastening rather than an end to a process that had been developing in the library at Cavendish Hall.
Over the last few months he’d begun to make frequent trips, at Henry Cavendish’s invitation, to the Hall. Much of his spare time had been spent in the library. His reading had been focused on history initially but slowly expanded out as Henry introduced him to science.
His reading of history suggested that the war would take time to progress. Listening to Henry made him comprehend just how unprepared the country was. Any call up might take much longer to occur than they realised. As the nation made provision for the coming struggle, it would need to develop strategies that encompassed military and civil life: the building of armaments and ensuring the security and continuity of food production was more important now than battle planning.
Without dismissing Hugh’s comment, Danny explained this to the group, who listened in silence. Afterwards it was clear that, to a man and boy, they would all volunteer to serve. Some of the farm hands wanted to volunteer immediately but Danny counselled against this.
‘I’m telling you, right at this moment the best way we can help is to do what we’re doing. The country needs food,’ said Danny looking at Bert Gissing and his friends, who had been most in favour of immediate enlisting. ‘We’ll hear soon enough what’s needed of us.’
There was a quiet authority in Danny now that seemed at odds with the lad they had grown up with. The young lad they remembered was someone always on the lookout for a bit of mischief. Now he’d changed. They had all changed of course, but the change in Danny went beyond the merely physical.
All knew of the friendship with Cavendish family. All knew how much time he spent up at the Hall. No one begrudged him this. He was still one of them. Instead, there was an unspoken pride in the fact that Lord Cavendish could also see what they had long suspected.
Of course, boys will always be boys. The gravity of the day gradually gave way to the enthusiasm and irreverence of youth. War was on everyone’s mind now but no more or less than the other overriding interest of these boys.
A few girls began to appear in the village street in groups. The boys soon forgot about their fears and joined them in the dance that has existed since the beginning of time. Some of the girls came over and joined Danny’s group sitting in the middle of the village. Soon the steps of the Great War memorial listing all those who had died in the previous conflict were covered with young people. The memorial had been erected at Henry Cavendish’s wish and expense.
‘What will you do now?’ asked Margaret Desmond, the sister of Ben who was now working at the forge.
Hugh and Tom turned to Danny, now the unofficial spokesman for the group. He told them what he had told the rest earlier. Another asked when they would be leaving for the fight.
‘After I marry you, gorgeous,’ came the reply from Hugh. This brought a host of jeers from the girls. But the mood had been lightened and the comments took on a more risqué nature as the young people of the village chased away the dark thoughts of war.
In its place came a more intense focus on the things that mattered to them. Driven by the fear for the future, friendships deepened between the girls and the boys. Thoughts and feelings, once undeclared, became common currency that night. The air became sweeter, and colours more vivid as all developed an appreciation for a life that once had been taken for granted.
Sitting apart from this was Danny. His thoughts were elsewhere. A few of the girls tried to engage him in conversation but gave up and sought solace and company with other more willing boys. As the evening light was replaced by darkness the centre of the village became quiet again.
For all his comments about the time it would take before the call ups began, Danny returned to the certainty that it was when and not if. Like his father, he would answer the call, fearfully but willingly. It was no more or less than what his country would expect. It was what other young men would do. What his father had done. This made things explicit. The consequences of the wireless broadcast were all too apparent, the cost incalculable, the outcome unknowable.
Danny trudged back to the house knowing his world was going change. He had no power to direct its course. He could only to respond to its prompt. This, more than any sense of fear, was what he hated: the inscrutable uncertainty of war.
Chapter 4: Germany 1938 - 39
1
Ladenburg (nr. Heidelberg): Christmas Eve 1938
The church hall was full of song and a lifeforce so strong it seemed the place would explode with the energy within. Manfred and Erich were now the group leaders of the village Hitler Youth group. They sat in front of the boys leading the singing ‘Es Zittern die Morschen Knochen’ (The Rotten Bones are Trembling).
Trembling are the rotten bones
Of the world before the Red War.
We smashed the terror,
For us it was a great victory.
We will march on
Even when everything falls in shards,
For today Germany is listening to us
And tomorrow the whole world.
Manfred could see tears in the eyes of some of the children. They sang with passion, with volume and with their hearts. There was little beauty in the noise they made. Instead, the music was more primeval. It seemed to emanate not just from the souls of the young people but also from the core of the building.
All of the boys were dressed in a similar uniform: khaki shirts and black scarf. This group now included children as young as ten, members of a separate group Deutsches Jungvolk in der Hitler Jugend (German Youngsters in the Hitler Youth).
The group of boys marched out into the street singing, led by Manfred and Erich, holding a large flag emblazoned with a swastika. Manfred could see his father watching the procession. He had reluctantly ordered the policemen to stop the traffic in order to let the boys pass. Father and son looked at one another. Manfred felt almost drunk with power. He gave his father a brief nod as he passed him. His father’s face was unreadable.
Snow fluttered lazily onto their faces as they marched. The pavements were blanketed by snow and the chill cut the faces of the boys as they marched through the town singing Nazi marching songs; their hearts, as much as the drums, beat the pace of their march.
A few women made attempts at saluting, but Manfred could see their hearts weren’t in it. This made him angry. He stopped the boys in the middle of the street, holding up the traffic behind. For a minute they marched on the spot and then he moved them forward again towards the market Platz.
All around them, the shops were decorated for Christmas. In the market Platz, alongside the war memorial, stood a very tall Christmas tree. The marchers stopped by the Christmas tree and sang the ‘Horst Weisel Lied’ (The song of Horst Weisel), a song dedicated to the memory of a Nazi murdered by a communist. When the song finished, they applauded their own efforts. Erich stood up and addressed his audience.
‘I think maybe it is time that we,’ he paused for effect. Then with a wide grin he said, ‘…have a snowball fight.’ In a flash, he bent down, scooped up a handful of snow, compressed it with his other hand and threw it at Manfred.
This was greeted with loud cheers. Moments later, Manfred was hit on the side of the head by another snowball. Ice flowed down the side of his face like an open wound. He roared in laughter and set about avenging himself on the culprit. Snowballs whistled past him and he felt the melted snow trickle down the back of his neck. He compressed the snow together in his hand, the cold stinging his hands and let fly. Another snowball hit hi
m and then another. He was a natural target for the small boys, and they were now liberally pelting him, emboldened by a fire within. Snow crunched under Manfred’s boots as he sought cover, realising he was hopelessly outgunned.
Passers-by joined in the snowball fight and soon battle lines were drawn between young and old. Erich stayed with the young boys, but Manfred led counter attacks by the adults. The effort was telling on Manfred. His breath came out in white puffs, his heart beat fast and the cold of the snow chilled his fingers so much they could hardly bend.
The fight ended when Erich sued for peace and re-assembled the boys around the Christmas tree for another rousing rendition of ‘Heil Hitler Dir’. A few of the adults joined in saluting as they did so. Many of the other townsfolk returned to finish the last-minute shopping, tired of the songs, tired of children screaming ‘Heil Hitler’, tired of the cold.
Manfred caught a glimpse of his father in the distance. He looked at the melee impassively. Then he climbed into a police car and drove away. For a moment Manfred was glad that he’d left. Then an emptiness descended on him. He realised he would have liked his father to join in. But then perhaps his position militated against such frivolity.
His father had never exhibited any sign of playfulness with Manfred, even as a child. Yes, he remembered moments when his father seemed to be enjoying himself. But superficiality made him uncomfortable. He was not a light-hearted person. He was the chief of police and he was now irrelevant.
2
28th December 1938
Manfred looked outside his window. The early morning light reflected off the snow and blinded him momentarily. The sky was steel-grey, heavy with snow. Soon the cloud would unburden itself, and the air would become white. Back to bed, thought Manfred. He was about to go back to bed when he caught a glimpse of Nina Kruger sitting in the square with a friend. She was the prettiest girl in the class. Her long blonde hair was tied in a ponytail and plaited. Clear blue eyes hid beneath impossibly long eyelashes. All of the boys wanted to court her, but her father refused to let them near.
