Searching for Shona

by Margaret J. Anderson

  “Please don’t make me go!” Marjorie begged. “I’ll be safe here. Other children don’t have to go to Canada. They get to stay here—I saw a picture in the paper of children from London going to the country.”

  “They’re just not so lucky as you. Not everyone has cousins in Canada who’ll give them a home,” said Mrs. Kilpatrick. She was not an imaginative woman. Ignoring Marjorie’s panic, she set about packing in her usual methodical way.

  “Your Uncle didn’t give us much warning,” she complained. “Here it is Friday, and he expects me to have everything ready by Monday. It’s lucky you have a passport, because you’ll need that.”

  She found Marjorie’s passport in the desk drawer and said, “Dear me! I hope they believe this is you at the customs office. You’ve really changed in the last two years.”

  Marjorie looked at the small, nondescript unsmiling face staring back from the picture. It was a poor picture, slightly blurred, and her hair was short instead of in braids as she wore it now. It occurred to Marjorie that the customs officer might not let her pass, thinking she was traveling on someone else’s passport. For a moment, she felt hopeful, but the decided it was unlikely he’d hold up the whole group over one blurry picture.

  And then a new worry plagued her. Suppose she arrived in Canada and there was no one to meet her. She didn’t know Uncle Fergus’s cousin, and the cousin didn’t know her. There would be hundreds of children on the boat. How were they going to find one another? Suppose this cousin didn’t really want her to come and didn’t even bother to meet the boat ….

  During the day, Marjorie knew her fears were exaggerated yet at night they invaded her dreams. She tossed and turned, afraid to sleep and unable to stay awake. The nights were long and restless, but the days went by all too fast.

  On the morning of Monday, September 25, Mrs. Kilpatrick took Marjorie and her luggage by taxi to Waverley Station. The station was the scene of utter chaos. Several different schools were being evacuated, not to Canada like Marjorie, but to small towns in the south of Scotland. Mrs. Kilpatrick gave Marjorie into the care of a tall, severe lady, who checked various lists and tickets and finally pinned an armband to Marjorie’s coat and told her to wait beside a pile of luggage. A number of other somber-looking children and their tearful parents stood there, waiting until it was time to board the train.

  Mrs. Kilpatrick hung around looking uncertain. She felt she should wait to see Marjorie on her way, but Marjorie was so sullen and unhappy that they had nothing to say to one another. It was hard to tell how long the wait would be. Mrs. Kilpatrick’s bunions were beginning to hurt and she longed for a cup of tea.

  “Do you want me to stay, my dear?” she asked.

  “I don’t care,” Marjorie answered with a shrug.

  “Well, I’ll be running along then.” Mrs. Kilpatrick fumbled in her handbag and pulled out half a crown and gave it to Marjorie. “Here, my dear! But don’t spend it on sweeties before you get on the boat. They might make you sick.”

  It was an unnecessary remark because Marjorie was feeling sick already. She accepted the money ungraciously and watched Mrs. Kilpatrick walk away without any show of emotion. Then, suddenly, Marjorie wanted to call her back. She didn’t want to be left completely alone among all these strangers. But Mrs. Kilpatrick was swallowed up by another tide of children who came tumbling down the long flight of stairs leading to the station. They carried their belongings in small suitcases and paper carrier bags, and they all had gas masks slung across their shoulders so that, at a glance, they looked like tourists with cameras.

  One of the children waved to Marjorie, and she found herself again face to face with Shona.

  “Where are you goin’?” Shona asked, setting down the small cardboard suitcase she was carrying. She wore her name, SHONA McINNES, on a large label pinned to her coat.

  “Canada,” Marjorie said mournfully.

  “Ooh! Aren’t you lucky!” Shona said. “Are all these people going too?”

  “Just the children,” Marjorie answered. “But I don’t know any of them. Where are you going?”

  “Our school’s being sent to some place in the country. They haven’t told us where. I wish I was going to Canada, though. Do you go in a boat?”

  Marjorie nodded unhappily. “I’d rather be you, just going to the country.”

  “Pity we couldn’t change places, then,” Shona said with a laugh.

  The rest of the Preston Primary children had moved down the platform and were gathered around three harassed teachers, but there were so many children in the station that it was hard to say where one group started and another left off. As Marjorie watched them all wandering about, an idea began to grow in her mind—a wild, exciting, impossible idea.

  “I’d better go,” Shona said, reaching for her battered suitcase. “I don’t suppose we’ll see each other for a while, but I’ll look for you in the park when this old war’s over.”

  “Just a minute,” Marjorie said breathlessly. “Why don’t you go to Canada instead of me? They wouldn’t know.”

  “But don’t you need papers and things?”

  “Just a passport, and mine’s two years old. I had short hair then. The picture’s about as much like you as it is like me.”

  “But what would you do?” Shona asked.

  “I’ll go to the country in place of you. By the time they notice, it’ll be too late to do anything.”

  “But they’d spot you right away,” Shona said looking at Marjorie’s green coat. It wasn’t the kind of coat children attending Preston Primary wore—too new and stylish for that.

  “Not if I wore your clothes,” Marjorie said. “I could keep out of the way of the teachers. Would the other girls notice? Would they tell?”

  Shona looked at Marjorie and a smile spread over her face. It really might work! And how she would like to wear that coat!

  “Let’s go to the ladies’ room and swap clothes,” Shona said, speaking quickly in case Marjorie should change her mind.

  The woman in charge was still busy with lists and tickets. Shona and Marjorie dodged behind the pile of luggage and ran to the crowded waiting room. A few minutes later, inside a rest room, they quickly undressed right down to their underwear and changed clothes. Shona’s gray skirt and woolen jersey fit Marjorie quite well, but the short red coat was even shorter and tighter on Marjorie than it had been on Shona. Shona wriggled around, trying to see herself in Marjorie’s pale green dress and black patent shoes.

  “Where are the rest of your things?” Shona asked.

  “In the pile of luggage where I was standing. They’re labeled. You’ll find them all right. And the woman’s got my passport. Just don’t forget your name! Do I look all right?”

  “Except for the pigtails,” Shona said, looking at her anxiously. “They’re a dead giveaway. Nobody at school has pigtails and all the girls from St. Anne’s have short hair. Matron cuts it herself and always makes a mess of it.”

  Marjorie searched in her shoulder bag and found the red manicure set that Mrs. Kilpatrick had given her on her last birthday. Taking out the small nail scissors, she held one braid in her left hand and chopped her way through it, and then she did the same with the other braid. Even Matron, who didn’t have high standards when it came to hairdressing, would have been shocked by Marjorie’s ragged hair. But there was no mirror, and Marjorie simply pulled Shona’s beret firmly down onto her head. Someone was hammering at the door. There was no more time.

  “You’d better take this,” Marjorie said, handing Shona the shoulder bag.

  “And you’d better have my gas mask. It’s got my name on it.”

  Marjorie reluctantly accepted the square cardboard box that contained the ugly, rubber mask and was immediately beset by doubts. She couldn’t possibly pass herself off as Shona. And did she really want to? Did she want to be one of the children from Preston Primary School heading for some unknown town to stay with unknown people? Surely, she would have been better off g
oing to Canada where there were no gas masks, no blackout, no threat of bombs, no war.

  Shona had moved ahead and was already back to the place where they’d left their luggage. Running to catch up, Marjorie said breathlessly, “I don’t think it will work, Shona. The teachers will know I shouldn’t be there, and this Matron you spoke about, won’t she spot me?”

  “She’s going with the wee ones from St. Anne’s,” answered Shona. “She’s not even going to the same town. Us older ones are being evacuated with Preston Primary School, and Miss Watson, one of the teachers, is in charge. I’ve never had her, so you’re all right there. We’ve got partners and mine’s Anna Ray. She won’t tell on you, but I promised Matron that I would look out for her.”

  “What do you mean—look out for her?” Marjorie asked.

  “She’s a bit—well—not too bright, and Matron said I was to look after her. She’ll find it hard living in someone else’s house. You’d better go now—they’re moving.”

  But Marjorie had one last thought. “How will we change back?” she asked.

  “I’ll work that out,” Shona said, giving Marjorie a push. “After the war—in Holyrood Park.”

  Marjorie picked up Shona’s small cardboard suitcase, which was unexpectedly heavy, and walked off down the platform without looking back. She told herself that if she could just stay hidden among these school children until the next day, then the boat would sail to Canada without her. Beyond that, she wasn’t going to think.

  Anna Ray. Anna Ray. Marjorie scanned the labels on the children’s coats, searching for the girl who was to be her partner. A small, forlorn child, with short black hair and dark eyes, was standing beside a porter’s trolley. Older children were jostling for a place to sit on the trolley while they waited, but the little girl paid no attention to them. Even before Marjorie could read the label on her coat, she was sure this must be Anna, and when she got close to her, she found she was right.

  “Anna,” she said softly. “I’m going with you instead of Shona. We’re going to be partners.”

  Anna looked at Marjorie with round frightened eyes and then reached out and touched the red coat.

  “I want Shona,” she said.

  “I’m going instead. You can call me Shona.”

  But Anna drew back, her lower lip trembled, and then she began to cry. Marjorie would have turned back to look for Shona right then had not one of the teachers in charge announce that all the children in Miss Watson’s group were to board the train. Marjorie and Anna were engulfed by the noisy, excited crowd of boys and girls.

  They found seats together in an overcrowded compartment. The other children were much too excited to care that Marjorie didn’t belong with them. She quickly slipped off her coat and folded it carefully so that the name pinned to it didn’t show.

  When the train started with a jerk, the children responded with a wild cheer, but even before they were out of the station, it stopped again, and there was a long delay. Marjorie wondered nervously why they were waiting. Was Miss Watson checking to see that she had all the children in her group? Anna was still sobbing. Marjorie could think of nothing comforting to say, and the other children in the compartment paid no attention to her.

  When the train finally started again, everyone was more subdued. Some were already eating the sandwiches and bars of chocolate they had brought along to eat on the journey, and Anna brightened up at the prospect of food. She rubbed away her tears with the back of her hand, leaving her face streaked with dirt. Then she pulled a paper bag from her pocket and took out a squashed jam sandwich.

  Marjorie felt in the pocket of Shona’s coat, wondering if she, too, had some lunch. Anna watched with her round dark eyes and then said, “Shona ate hers already. Before we left.”

  It didn’t really matter, Marjorie told herself. She wasn’t the least bit hungry. She stared out of the window, as towns, villages, fields, and farms passed in a blur. What was going to happen when they found out she wasn’t Shona? She tried to imagine how Shona was feeling, but she had the suspicion that Shona was probably quite unconcerned and might even be enjoying herself. After all, Shona had managed to miss school four days last week without being caught.

  “Where is Shona?” Anna asked in a low voice, pulling at Marjorie’s sleeve to attract her attention.

  “We’ve changed places,” Marjorie said. “So now I’m Shona.”

  The words echoed in Marjorie’s mind. She looked down at the unfamiliar clothes—the unpressed gray skirt, the matted jersey, the faded red coat folded over her lap so that the ripped lining was exposed. Did these make her Shona?

  “Matron said Shona had to stay with me,” Anna said in her small, persistent voice.

  “I’ll stay with you,” promised Marjorie, and Anna gave her a watery smile.

  When it began to get dark outside, a conductor came along snapping down the window blinds, leaving the carriage lit only by the faint glow of dim blue light bulbs. The faces of the other children stood out as pale ovals and everything else merged into darkness.

  Then the train stopped at a small station, and Marjorie heard a porter call out in a singsong voice, “Canonbie! Canonbie! Everybody for Canonbie!”

  Where had she heard that name recently, Marjorie wondered. Before she could place it, Miss Watson came along telling them in an agitated voice that this was their stop.

  There was a mad scramble for coats and suitcases. Anna began to cry because she’d lost her gas mask and wouldn’t get out of the train without it. All the other children had climbed down onto the platform, and Marjorie was panic-stricken in case the train started before they got out. She groped under the seat and at last felt the square box. Jerking it out, she handed it to Anna.

  “Put the strap over your shoulder and hurry up!” she said. “We don’t want to be left behind.”

  The station, like the train, was lit only by eerie blue light bulbs, giving the place an unreal, dreamlike quality. Even the boldest boys crowded around Miss Watson, intimidated by the strangeness of their surroundings.

  They were led down the street to a bare church hall where a square woman with a deep voice told them she was Mrs. Brown, the billeting officer, and that she would assign them to their families. She gestured toward a crowd of people, standing around drinking tea from thick white cups, who had watched them come in.

  All this time Anna was holding Marjorie’s hand tightly. Marjorie looked down at her and saw that her nose was running and her face was streaked with tears. The pocket of her coat was torn and her shoe lace untied. Had there been a mirror in the hall, Marjorie would have seen that she didn’t look much better herself. Her too-small coat made her appear gawky and overgrown, and her hair stuck out from under her beret in uneven tufts.

  “Shona McInnes,” Mrs. Brown’s voice boomed out.

  Marjorie walked shakily forward, Anna still clinging to her hand.

  “Is this your sister?” the billeting officer asked.

  “No, ma’am,” whispered Marjorie.

  “Only sisters and brothers can request a home together—not friends.”

  “Shona was to look out for me,” Anna said, starting to cry again. “Matron said Shona was to stay with me.”

  “Oh, you’re from the orphanage,” the woman said, running her pencil down the list. “What’s your name?”

  “Anna Ray.”

  “We’ll send you both to the Miss Campbells then.” She raised her voice and shouted, “Miss Campbell, I’ve got two little girls here for you—if you’ll just come over to this table and sign the papers.”

  A small, thin lady with brown hair and round glasses came forward to the table and looked at the two girls cautiously. Anna stopped crying and looked timidly up at Miss Campbell.

  “My sister … my sister said not to get girls who wouldn’t be old enough to do for themselves. We’re often busy … with the shop, you know.” Miss Campbell spoke in a nervous, apologetic voice, rather as if she didn’t expect Mrs. Brown to listen to her an
d that is, in fact, what happened.

  “We can’t have exactly what we want, not with a war on,” Mrs. Brown said brusquely, and pushed forward some papers for Miss Campbell to sign. With one last nervous glance at Anna, Miss Campbell wrote her name and then told the girls to come along with her.

  “Is this all you brought?” she asked, looking at their small suitcases.

  “Yes, Miss Campbell,” said Marjorie.

  “I’ll take yours,” Miss Campbell said, reaching for Anna’s case.

  It was very dark outside. Apparently the Canonbie blackout was strictly enforced because no lights showed anywhere. Miss Campbell switched on a small flashlight and the girls stayed close beside her, trying to walk in the dancing pool of light that shone dimly ahead of them. At last, they turned into a small gate, and Marjorie stumbled over a step.

  “We’ll go through to the kitchen, and I’ll get you girls a bite to eat,” Miss Campbell said, ushering the girls inside. “My sister is still at the shop—all these new regulations and forms to sign with the war.”

  She raked the fire to life and put on a kettle and then set the table, all the time talking nervously. Luckily, she didn’t seem to expect an answer because Anna was too shy to speak and Marjorie too preoccupied.

  When tea was ready, she told the girls to pull up chairs to the table. Anna ate hungrily, but Marjorie was unable to swallow anything.

  “Oh, dear!” Miss Campbell said, shaking her head. “I hope you’re not a picky eater. My sister doesn’t like picky eaters.”