An Army of Smiles

by An Army of Smiles (retail) (epub)

  He went outside to where he had parked the Vincent. Beside it was a baker’s van. With half an eye watching the pub doorway, he took out the narrow rubber pipe he used to steal petrol, then hurriedly replaced it as footsteps approached. It was the same RAF man, who said, ‘You might try the CAB, the Citizens’ Advice Bureau. It was set up in 1939 to help missing people to get in touch, or help families who’d been separated or bombed out. They could be a bit cagey as it’s someone serving in the forces like your daughter, but worth a try.’

  Thanking him, Dai shuffled off, his heavy boots scuffing through the gravel on the forecourt until he saw the man disappear once again into the pub. He syphoned enough petrol to fill his tank, replaced the petrol tank cover and drove off. Hope was revived. It was time to go home again and find out more about the CAB.

  * * *

  At home, Molly was sitting at the table surrounded by papers. Bills mainly and most of those unpaid. She had managed to keep from her son the seriousness of the situation but unless she had payment for the vegetables she had supplied, and within the next few days, which would enable her to deal with some of the most urgent debts, there was a chance of court proceedings.

  Where was Dai? He hadn’t been home for two weeks. He had cleared the ground and planted the last of the winter cabbages and weeded around the leeks and sprout plants and then had gone off again on his motorbike without collecting the money they were owed.

  She had tried to collect some of the debts and had managed to retrieve a few pounds, but the work on the land plus managing the house was all she could find time for. Besides, asking for money was something she didn’t find easy to do. That had always been Dai’s job – and few argued when he asked for settlement, she thought grimly.

  The sound of his motorbike reached her ears. There was no mistaking its powerful four-stroke engine. Throwing down the pencil she went to open the door.

  As usual he didn’t bother to explain where he had been, only that he hadn’t found Ethel. She didn’t waste time arguing or asking questions, she had given up asking for explanations for his frantic search, she just asked him to collect some debts before the situation became worse.

  ‘I’ll do it first thing in the morning,’ he told her as he poured himself some tea from the teapot in the hearth. ‘I need some cash for work that needs doing on the bike.’

  He had been drinking and went to bed almost at once, where he lay on his back, smelling less than sweet, flat out, fully dressed and snoring fit to rattle the roof tiles.

  She stared down at him and thought back over their marriage, remembering the early years when everything seemed perfect. She had known about his temper before they married, but believed his promises, sure she would help him to keep them. His rages were kept under control by living out in the country, where he saw few people, and working alone, driving lorries from town to town. He was very strong and worked hard developing the market garden. All day and half the night when needed. It was only rarely that he got drunk.

  The increase in his drinking was hardly noticed at first, but there was an arrest and a fine, then another and another, until the first jail sentence made her aware of how serious the problem had become. They had been happy at first, building their life together, the children bringing their joy, and although she tried to work out why it had all gone wrong, she failed to understand what it was that drove him into this wild fury that was destroying them all. Now she had gone past attempting to understand. What she wanted now was revenge.

  After waiting for several hours, her eyes gleaming with determination, she put on a dark coat and went out to where the bike was parked. Opening the petrol cap she managed to push the vehicle over on to its side. Petrol leaked out and with a piece of a metal shovel, keeping her hands and clothes well clear of the dangerous fluid, she scooped some over the shining machine. Then she dropped a lighted match at the end of the river of liquid.

  Startled by the fierce violence of the gush of flames she ran back to the house, heart racing, scrubbed her hands clean, stripped off all the clothes she was wearing for fear of them being contaminated by the powerful smell, and carefully slid into bed without waking him. She didn’t sleep.

  Luckily they were too far out of town for a warden to come and complain about the light from the burning bike. No one was likely to see the fire and report it. She got out of bed after a while and through a gap in the curtains looked out, watching the conflagration until the metal glowed and flames died and the dark night and the silence crept back.

  * * *

  The girls’ destination was Egypt and as they disembarked the heat was a surprise. The ship had seemed cool by comparison to the blazing sun and the heat rising from the ground. Mersa Matruh they found enchanting, with its blue lagoon and small neat bungalows. The picturesque scene was ruined by the makeshift stores and buildings all around but their first sight showed them only the beauty of the place. The beauty and the welcome from the men.

  When they stepped ashore the men waiting to greet them cheered and ran towards them. To the soldiers they were a reminder of home: pretty girls in their familiar blue overalls, offering char and a wad, would be a scene to warm their hearts.

  There was no time to daydream. They were put to work straight away.

  Several supply ships had been sunk by enemy action but others were on the way and the stores had to be ready and made secure. Ethel was given a job in the Bulk Issue Stores from where the goods were ordered by the various canteens, the goods made up to be collected and paid for. The canteen was already active but the men had been given leave, so they would take over from the following evening. While Ethel dealt with the orders and managed the money, the Bulk Issue Stores always dealing in cash, Rosie and Kate were kept busy unpacking and stacking the heavy boxes, with a sergeant helping between ticking everything off on a list.

  Exhausted, they were then taken to the newly opened canteen and told to prepare food for opening time. ‘If this is how we have to carry on, I don’t think I’ll last the year,’ Kate sighed, referring to their contract for the posting. ‘A year! We’ll be worse off than we were with Walter the Creep!’

  ‘I don’t mind how hard I work as long as we can stay together,’ Rosie sighed as they washed and changed into their overalls for their first evening session. They began early, and their first tasks as always were sandwiches and teas and coffee, plus the famous Naafi rock cakes.

  Four and a half pounds of flour, two pints of water, margarine, tinned milk, baking powder, sugar and dried eggs and twelve ounces of currants went into the mix, plus all the other ingredients that gave the cakes their special flavour. They could have chanted the list in their sleep.

  The uncooked cakes had to be exactly one and a quarter ounces each, but after a few weighed for accuracy the girls had quickly learned to use their eye and rarely made a mistake. They managed to achieve the instructed seventy cakes per mix every time. The cakes were washed over with milk before baking to give them a bit of a shine.

  ‘I wonder how many of these I’ve made since joining up?’ Rosie sighed as they put the last batch into the huge ovens.

  ‘I wonder how many more we’ll have to make before we finish,’ Kate sighed.

  ‘I’m getting tired of it all too,’ Ethel confessed. ‘Although I’ve no idea what I’ll do after the war ends. What jobs will be open to someone who can make Naafi rock cakes and has travelled a bit?’

  ‘Plenty,’ Rosie said firmly. ‘I’d be prepared to cook anything anywhere and that must be useful. In fact, I think I might train properly, become a proper cook before we open our café. What d’you think?’

  ‘I think it would be fine as long as I don’t have to see another rock cake,’ Kate laughed.

  ‘Another batch, please, ladies,’ a voice called, and with a sigh, Rosie reached towards the flour bin.

  * * *

  Wesley was close to the front line. His van went back and forward between base and the men, with food and hot drinks. He went as close as
he dared to where the men were dug in, in a holding position just behind the line of guns. The noise at times was almost deafening, the planes overhead, the guns of both sides booming and the squeals and thuds as shells and bombs landed close, sending gouts of fire and earth skyward. Debris of destroyed vehicles and ominously still bodies were all around him as he made his way through the medics as they searched for the wounded among the dead.

  He was told to go back but, pointing to his ears, he feigned deafness and carried on handing out tea and a wad to anyone who needed them. They thought he was brave but he knew different. They didn’t know the truth, that when pain was involved he was a coward. The bullets and bomb splinters flying around didn’t represent pain, not like having a man in front of you flexing muscles and folding his fists. The danger around him was more abstract and easier for him to cope with, but he was not the stuff heroes were made of, you only had to talk to Ethel to know that.

  * * *

  When the sleepless night had passed, Molly Twomey rose to make a start on her busy day. Closing the curtains, she struck a match and lit the candle that would light her way down the stairs. She moved about as she dressed, trying to wake Dai so he’d be aware of her rising at the usual time of the morning. As she was leaving the room he woke and asked the time.

  ‘Six o’clock,’ she told him, afraid to look at him in case he saw the guilt in her eyes.

  ‘Wake me at eight,’ he instructed. ‘I want to go into town and find the Citizens’ Advice Bureau.’

  ‘What d’you want advice on?’ she asked. Then, as there was no reply, she went downstairs and began cleaning out the grate to light the fire. Her hands shook every time she thought of what she had done. Well, he would never think of her being responsible; she was too much the cowed and submissive wife.

  A knock at the door heralded the arrival of the postman. She wondered why he had knocked, then realized he must have seen the motorbike. Thank goodness she wouldn’t be alone when Dai was told.

  Dai thundered down the stairs still wearing the clothes of the day before, boots unlaced, his red face unwashed, smeared with yesterday’s dirt that had been thrown up from the roads.

  He stared disbelievingly at the remains of his beautiful Vincent, then his malevolent eyes stared at Molly. Instinctively the postman moved to stand beside her, although what he could have done to help her against the rage-filled giant of a man he couldn’t guess.

  ‘Where’s Sid?’ Dai demanded. ‘He’s done this!’

  ‘He’s at work. He finishes at six but might have worked an extra shift, you know they have to when there’s a big rush on. He’s been nowhere near home since last night.’ She trembled at Dai’s accusation. That was something she hadn’t thought of.

  ‘He wasn’t at work,’ he said, ‘he was here, doing this!’

  ‘Of course he wasn’t!’ She was on the point of confessing. She couldn’t allow him to blame their son for this. ‘I did it,’ she said defiantly. ‘I went down, pushed it over and set fire to it.’

  Dai turned to her and, holding her by her thin shoulders, shook her angrily. ‘D’you think I’m stupid or something? I know who did this and your attempts at covering up for him won’t work.’

  The postman was alarmed at the way he was hurting his wife and tried to intervene. Temper exploded and Dai shouted abuse and hit out at them both. Then, pushing Molly and the postman aside, he lumbered down the path, over the footbridge to where the postman’s red pushbike stood propped against a tree, and rode off.

  ‘Sid was at work!’ Molly shouted.

  ‘I’ll give him work! I’m going to show you what a liar he is, my wonderful son! If he hasn’t been there, I’ll find him. I’ll kill him for this,’ Dai called back.

  Around the next corner he felt a strange sensation in his head and his heart raced wildly. A car approached and in an attempt to avoid hitting it, Dai pulled on the brakes but nothing happened; he had no strength, his arms felt like paper, his fingers refused to do what he asked of them and his legs were unable to propel him. His eyes seemed unable to see where he was going – with the sound of the angry car driver’s horn filling his head with pain and confusion, he fell off.

  * * *

  ‘He’s had a stroke, I’m afraid,’ the hospital doctor told Molly and Sid later that day. ‘We’ll keep him in for a while but then you’ll have to look after him at home.’

  ‘But I can’t,’ Molly tried to explain. ‘How can I look after him and keep the market garden running and everything else I have to do? What would we live on?’ Then she whispered, half to herself, ‘Where’s our Ethel? She has to come home and help me, he can’t harm her now, she has to come home.’

  Two weeks later Dai was carried into the house, a young land girl was promised to give much-needed help with the vegetable crops and Molly stared angrily at her husband. For the first time since they had married she told him what she thought of him.

  Once she began it poured out of her. She went on, hour after hour, listing all the resentments that had been suppressed over the years. Sid listened but didn’t try to stop her. She deserved this moment. When she had finally exhausted herself and the words had dried up she realized that even though she was facing months, perhaps years of looking after him, she was going to enjoy it. Her revenge would be something to savour. If only Ethel would come home.

  * * *

  Post was unreliable although the authorities realized the importance of the letters from home. Sometimes letters arrived that had been written several weeks before, many ended up at the bottom of the sea. Although none got through to Ethel, she never gave up hope; she continued to write to Albert and, although she thought it was useless, she wrote to Baba Morgan, wondering if she would ever see him again.

  Albert wrote to her often and his letters were becoming more affectionate. As her letters to him dwindled and finally ceased altogether, he wrote more often, presuming that she was not receiving his and was perhaps believing he had tired of the correspondence. He had to keep on writing and hoping that his letters would eventually catch up with her. He couldn’t lose her now. He cursed himself for hesitating too long.

  Baba wrote to Ethel and Kate and Rosie but again, due to the many changes of address, these had so far failed to arrive. Only letters from Kate’s parents and Rosie’s Nan got through. And letters to Kate from Vincent.

  When she was handed her mail with his neat writing on the envelope, which had been opened and on which several sentences had been blue-pencilled out, she would read and reread them and would eventually surface with such a vacant and dreamy look in her eyes that she earned the nickname Day Dream, which didn’t offend her at all.

  ‘That’s what I do most of the time I’m awake, daydream about when Vincent and I meet again,’ she told them. ‘And at night I dream some more. If only we could wangle some leave and I could see him again…’ And off she would go into another daydream.

  * * *

  Wesley’s letters from home reached him. His mother wrote regularly and somehow, with all the comings and goings, the secrecy of the journeys and routes and destinations, the efficient organization dealing with the mail found him. It was in a letter from his mother that he heard about Dai Twomey’s stroke. He wrote back telling his mother that if there was any way she could contact Ethel she should do so and tell her what had happened.

  She could go home now. From the sound of it, her father could no longer threaten her. For himself, he didn’t think he could ever face the man again no matter how weak and ill he had become. His humiliation wouldn’t go away that easily. He would see it in the man’s eyes.

  If only he knew where to find Ethel. He was on a few days’ leave and with others he volunteered to travel as extra guards with the goods sent out from the Bulk Issue Stores.

  * * *

  Less than twenty miles away from the ship in which Wesley sat and dreamed of her, Ethel and Rosie were setting up the counters ready for the evening opening of the canteen. They had been moved twice. Now th
e battle for North Africa was won, the bases were constantly moving and they moved with them. They were situated in a small garrison from where men and tanks still went out to mop up small pockets of resistance and gather in the prisoners.

  Tonight there was to be a concert. The band, which was made up mostly from men and women in the camp, was practising and the piano was played by a shy young girl who worked in the kitchens. Kate was turning the pages of her music.

  They were told that a train-load of supplies was due in and when called the band players went to help with the unloading and storage. As the canteen emptied, Kate and Ethel approached the piano and with the pianist’s willing accompaniment they began to sing. Others heard them and they were invited to join the rest of the amateur performers that evening.

  They were unable to leave their place during the concert but they sat on the counter during a lull and leaned towards the band and sang a few choruses, with Rosie singing silently between them.

  On a brief respite from his duties, Wesley and others came in, stood and watched for a while then went to bed. His tired eyes didn’t wander to the kitchens where Ethel was stacking used plates ready for washing. He watched Kate and Rosie for a moment wondering whether there was any point showing them his snap of Ethel but he turned away. The chances of them having seen her here were so slight it was hardly worth thinking about. He and his men were too tired to enjoy the entertainment and tomorrow they had to leave before first light. Rest was more important than entertainment or false hopes. He left as Ethel came out of the kitchen area and went among the tables to gather more dishes.