Remembrance Day

by Leah Fleming

  ‘Take your caps off, boys,’ said the housekeeper. ‘Wait here until you’re called. I’ll tell her ladyship you’ve arrived.’

  Even Newt and Frank were silenced by the echoes of their boots on the marble floor, the grandeur of the carved furniture, the foot of a real elephant full of walking sticks, vases the size of great copper boilers, and the face of the tiger sprawling at their feet. There was a smell of rose petals and polish. It felt a bit like the inside of the parish church, Selma thought. They seemed to wait for hours until the double doors to another vast room opened and a maid in a stiff white apron ushered them inside.

  A lady sat before them, her back as straight as a chapel pew. She wore a lavender dress with ruffles round her bosom, a choke of milk-white pearls, her face was pale and her white hair coiled high above her head like a helmet. She didn’t rise but gestured like a queen receiving courtiers in one of Selma’s old picture books.

  ‘So here you are…the Bartley brood.’ She examined each of them in turn. ‘Sturdy workhorses, by the look of you…Your names?’

  Selma bobbed a curtsy, suddenly struck dumb by the grandeur of the room, the marble fire surround, fine brass irons and a fire shield. Her dad would like the metalwork on display. There were silken rugs and cushions, silver candelabra and ornaments, draped curtains of heavy rust velvet, framed photographs gathered in a cluster. There was the scent of wood smoke and tobacco, and on the sideboard crystal bottles full of Satan’s brew. Such luxuries she’d never seen before.

  ‘Speak, girl,’ said Lady Hester impatiently.

  ‘This is Newton, the oldest, and my brother Frankland and I am Selima Bartley,’ she offered, seeing her brothers standing tongue-tied.

  ‘What peculiar names for Christian children,’ the lady replied. ‘You look more like Tom, Dick and Nellie to me. You will be pleased to know that Master Angus has made a full recovery, and is back at school with his brother. They wish me to thank you all for your part in the unfortunate accident. They wish you to know that they appreciate all the effort you made on their behalf. The Colonel and I of course endorse such sentiments. We agree therefore that you should all be given a token of our gratitude. Arkholme, fetch the tray.’

  Selma thought they were in for a bun feast but a silver tray with curlicue edges was placed on the table with a lace cloth. There were three gold coins, three half sovereigns, glinting in the sunlight.

  ‘Please take one each,’ said Lady Hester. ‘Tell your parents we are pleased that our tenants have brought up their children to be of such service to the community.’

  Selma grabbed the first coin and bobbed her curtsy, not knowing what to do next. Frank and Newt did the same and bowed. There was a silence and then Lady Hester rang a bell and the parlour maid ushered them to the door.

  ‘Just this once, let them go out the front entrance and down the steps. I expect they will want to admire the view to the river. Thank you and good day.’

  The audience was over. No handshake, no cup of tea and cake, no conversation. But most of all, no Guy or Angus in attendance.

  Disappointment rose like bile in Selma’s throat. All that dressing up for five minutes in a beautiful drawing room.

  How pokey, cold, plain and homespun their front room, with its rag rug and chenille tablecloth, would appear when she got home. How ordinary everything was. A splinter of discontent pierced her heart and she felt shame and pain.

  This was another world, a world of luxury and comfort the likes of which the Bartleys would never know. ‘We are all equal in the eyes of the Lord.’ Mam’s words rang in her head like a tolling bell. Why at this moment were they sounding so hollow?

  It was quite evident that they were not equal, or why did her ladyship not even stand or shake their hands? The gold coins meant nothing to the Cantrells. She had paid them for their services. Selma wanted to throw hers away in disgust. How dare they think so ill of them?

  What would Dad make of it all? Half a guinea to spend or save? The boys weren’t bothered either way, glad to be out in the fresh air, wanting to tear off their Sunday clothes.

  Selma felt a strange sadness when she opened the back door to their cottage.

  ‘Well? How did it go? That didn’t take long.’ Mam was anxious to hear every detail of the visit, stirring soup on the range.

  ‘It were all right…She give us one of these each.’ Selma plonked the coin on the table as if it was burning her fingers.

  ‘That’ll come in handy for your schooling,’ Essie smiled, and then she saw her face. ‘What’s up?’

  ‘Nothing. It were all so quick, in and out in five minutes as if we were the delivery boys.’

  ‘You didn’t get a look round, then?’ Essie registered surprise. ‘I thought the young masters would want to show you the horses.’

  ‘They’re back at school. It was a right thunder of nothing. I felt like a fool,’ Newt added. ‘She’s a right proud madam, is that one. Had us through the door in a flash in case we might steal owt, I reckon.’

  ‘Surely not.’ Essie sighed and shook her head. ‘I suppose we must expect that they do things different. Gentry folk don’t mix, never have except when they want the rent. She’s a bit stiff but I hear she’s very fond of her boys. They say she never had a nursemaid to them. Anyhow, I’m sure she was grateful.’

  ‘She didn’t look it. She looked at us as if we were the scrapings off her boot,’ muttered Frank.

  ‘Happen she’s just reserved with lower orders,’ Essie consoled.

  ‘You said we were all equal,’ Selma jumped in.

  ‘Aye, we are but that lot up there don’t know it yet. One day perhaps…Things’ll be better. You’ll see.’

  ‘I’m getting out of this clobber.’ Newt made for the stairs.

  ‘I’ll put the kettle on the hob. I gather she didn’t give you any tea then? I had hoped…never mind. Nowt as queer as folk.’

  ‘You can say that again,’ snapped Selma. ‘I’m never going back there.’ It wasn’t right to be made to feel small or ashamed of their fancy names as if they didn’t deserve them. Selima was her dad’s choice. It was foreign different. How dare Lady Hester belittle his choosing?

  The drill sergeant had them marching up and down the quadrangle of Sharland School. ‘Forward…at the double.’ He wanted them drill perfect for the next inspection day. The officer cadets were soldiers-in-waiting, pride of the school parades, but today Guy was out of step and not his usual efficient self. He couldn’t concentrate. Something was wrong and he didn’t know what. It kept making him lose his rhythm. He kept looking over to where his twin brother was marching, head up, eyes forward, a glint of steel in his eye. He was a born drill merchant, far better than he.

  Angus had made a remarkable recovery, only the gash on his left temple bearing evidence of his accident, and this was now hidden under a tuft of blond hair that fell like a forelock when it wasn’t plastered down. In their uniforms they were identical, but now all those pranks and swapping identities would not be so easy to go undetected. Angus was the one with the scar.

  Guy felt uneasy. Poor chap had no recollection of the accident or indeed the afternoon picnic or the jump when the Bartleys rescued him. It was as if the whole slate was wiped clean, had never happened until he looked in the mirror at his brow with disgust. Mother kept reminding him to be careful. She’d not wanted him back at school so soon. Angus had shrugged off her worries as fussing and brushed aside Guy’s enquiries about how he was feeling.

  Having a twin brother was both a blessing and a curse. There was always your own face looking back at you. It was always the two of them, dressed alike, objects of curiosity. Sometimes he felt as if they were one whole person split into two halves—or he did until the accident. Now he sensed Angus was changing and he was sure he was getting headaches because they throbbed in his own head. It was curious how when one of them was ill the other felt groggy too. Sometimes he sensed they could think each other’s thoughts before they spoke them, knew instinctively wha
t the other was going to say.

  He’d noticed that Angus didn’t concentrate on his studies for very long now, that he jumped up and paced round their study room, much more restless than last term. His tri-weekly test scores were much lower than his own and the competitive edge between them had vanished. All Angus wanted to do was run cross-country, chase up and down the rugger pitch and drill. They may still look like two peas in a pod but something had shifted. Guy had tried to speak to Mother and warn her something was up, but she put it all down to going back to school too early.

  At least she’d had the Bartleys to tea one afternoon and given them a present each but he was horrified when she’d told them she’d given them a coin as a token. It wasn’t his place to criticise her decision, though. He tried but failed to imagine her putting little Selma and her brothers at ease.

  Father would’ve been more gracious, but he was never around these days. Colonel ‘Give ’em hell’ Cantrell was now an important member of Lord Kitchener’s advisory staff. If war did come, as everyone was saying it would, they’d hardly see him.

  ‘Eyes right!’ shouted the drill sergeant.

  Damn! Guy nearly tripped into the back of Forbes Senior.

  ‘At ease, gentlemen. We will be stepping up training this term and for the foreseeable future. We want all Sharlanders to be prepared for every eventuality, to answer the call to arms, should the situation arise…’

  Suddenly there was a commotion in the rear and a chorus of ‘Sir!’ Guy spun round, suddenly sensing that it would be Angus on the ground. ‘It’s Cantrell Junior, sir! He’s fitting.’

  Angus was lying on the ground, spasms of jerking limbs, frothing at the mouth and a pool of wetness on his trousers. It was a frightful scene. Guy broke ranks to be at his side. ‘For God’s sake, give him some air!’ he heard himself shouting.

  ‘Take him to the san,’ someone yelled, but the master shoved them all aside.

  ‘Wait till he comes round.’ He turned to Guy. ‘How long has he had fits, Cantrell? Better put something on his tongue.’

  Someone with a satchel brought out a ruler. Everyone stood around. Guy felt sick and shaky. Then the twitching tremors stopped and Angus woke up dazed, surprised to find himself the object of attention.

  ‘What’s up? Guy? Did I fall?’

  ‘You’ll be fine, old chum. You had a bit of a turn, that’s all.’ Guy wanted to cover his wet trousers with his army jacket to mask his brother’s shame. The cadets were dismissed. Angus was carried to the san and the doctor summoned from the village.

  ‘What’s happened to him?’ Guy asked Matron, suddenly scared at such a public exhibition.

  ‘He had a seizure…nothing to worry about. It probably won’t happen again. Too much drilling, I expect,’ she fobbed him off. ‘Run along now…we’ll see what Dr Mackenzie has to say. Your parents will be informed in due course. It may be nothing but overtiredness.’

  ‘Can I stay?’ Guy pleaded, knowing Angus would be feeling strange on his own.

  ‘No, the boy needs rest and privacy…And he’s never done this before, you say?’

  Guy shook his head. Fits were terrifying to witness. He’d felt so helpless.

  ‘Ah well, growing pains and fits go hand in hand in my book,’ Matron smiled. ‘Doctor will know what’s best for him.’

  Guy ambled through the leafy grounds of Sharland School, puzzled, scared and confused. What if they made Angus leave? What if it happened again on the rugby pitch in a match, or riding across the moor, or with a gun in his hand? He was an outdoorsy chap, and Sharland was a school that fostered team spirit, personal challenges, fresh air and exercise. He’d never cope.

  Mother would have him home-tutored in a flash if she thought there was any danger.

  Guy stared up at the turrets of the stone building. He loved his Alma Mater, with its warren of study rooms, corridors, fine chapel and acres of playing fields.

  Angus wasn’t academic. He’d loathe being deskbound or cosseted. He needed open spaces, hunting over the fields to release all his spare energy. He bounded everywhere like an over excited Labrador puppy.

  Guy found a hidey-hole under a huge black poplar and whipped out his forbidden pipe. Had Angus’s jump from the Foss left permanent damage. Had it ruined his chance of an army career? Would he be an invalid? Guy couldn’t bear to see him unhappy and frustrated.

  Take a hold of yourself, he thought. Don’t get so windy! One fit doesn’t mean life in a basket chair. It was just a warning sign, that was all. If his brother calmed down and took enough rest and some pills, he’d be his old self again. Guy said a silent prayer to the Almighty to put everything back to normal.

  Reluctantly he lifted himself out of his funk hole and made for the school. He’d face a barrage of questions from his house chums on his return. It was none of their business but news would have already gone round the school like wild fire. Cantrell Junior had had a fit. The question was, would he have another?

  3

  Selma stared into the window of Bow’s Emporium on Market Square in Sowerthwaite. The window was lit up like a magic lantern with fairy figures in silhouette against a glowing sky. She couldn’t wait for Christmas to come and the first carollers to sing at the door for a slice of spiced loaf and hot elderberry cordial. It was cold and her breath was steaming up the window. Mam was doing her secret shopping on market day but it was already darkening fast and the sky was full of snow feathers. Selma’s feet were freezing on the stone pavement.

  She wandered past the toy shop, glad she was grown up enough now not to be disappointed by the lack of the Christmas dolls and games her other friends bragged about. This year there might be a new knitted cardigan with matching beret and scarf, a parcel of clothes from Aunty Ruth when she called in on Boxing Day, some of which might fit her, if she was lucky.

  Selma’d grown inches since the summer, and filled out. Her breasts were like two rubber balls sticking out of her thick vest, and with them came the curse one morning and all that messy business that Mam explained was a step on the way to being a proper young lady. But fourteen was not quite old enough to roll her hair over in pads like Marigold Plimmer did, the other pupil teacher and the bane of Selma’s life.

  Marigold was older by a year, pretty enough, clever too, but had a way of setting Selma’s teeth on edge. The Plimmers ran the Hart’s Head Inn on Elm Tree Square at the other end of Prospect Row, but not far enough from the teetotal Bartley forge for comfort on a noisy Saturday night. The pub had once been a house, with two fine bow windows and a large stable for horses at the back with benches for draymen to idle away their lunch times.

  Marigold and her mother, Betty, were also on the horse-drawn bus to Sowerthwaite alongside the Bartleys, boasting about how big a turkey they were going to carve and how Marie was getting a new tartan dress with a crocheted collar for the Sunday school Christmas concert.

  It was Marie who had pointed out that Selma and her brothers were heathens, since none of them had been baptised, and they would all go to Hell. Selma knew the Chapel didn’t do infant christenings but preferred them to make a profession of faith when they were teenagers, but it had still worried her for days afterwards.

  ‘What happens to my baby brothers and sisters who died before baptism?’ she had cried to Mam in distress one night. ‘Will they be saved?’

  ‘Of course. The Lord only lent them to us for a season. They are angels now in Glory, too lovely to live long in this wicked world. Take no notice of Marie Plimmer’s popish superstitions,’ Essie had reassured her, but Marie had a way of insinuating that chapelgoers were the poor relations in this village.

  The mill owner, Mr Best, was a big worker and Sunday school teacher, as was their organist and schoolmaster, Mr Firth. They had a great concert party and outings to the seaside at Morecambe, fun and games at Christmas like everyone else.

  Dad said that Christmas was the Lord’s birthday, not theirs, and the heart of Christmas was in giving to others, not wanting for yourse
lf. But on this chill December afternoon, the forthcoming Christmas festivities glowed like a beacon on a dark night with all the special baking, the scent of spices, roasting meat and the promise of fun and games.

  Farmer Dinsdale up the dale had promised them a joint of pork as a thank you for Dad’s good services to his Clydesdale horses over the year.

  Selma knew all about pig sticking and slaughter at this time of year. The poor beasts were cornered and hung upside down with their throats cut to bleed into a bucket for black puddings. But she did love a roast with crunchy crackling and Mam’s special herb stuffing. Her mouth was watering at the very thought, making her forget the chill of the wild north-easterly as it tore through her thin coat and scarf: a lazy wind, they called this, one as went through you not round you. It was time to make for the bus home.

  Then she caught sight of a tall young man striding across the square, parcels under his arm and another identical figure chasing after him. They looked so smart in thick tweed suits with Sharland School scarves flapping behind them, those distinctive purple and gold stripes that marked the public school boys out from other town scholars. Who could miss the Cantrell twins doing their own Christmas shopping?

  Selma tried not to stare and pulled her muffler over her face to spare her blushes but not before she caught the eye of the first twin.

  ‘Hello there, Miss Bartley…Busy with your Christmas shopping too,’ he said. ‘And you’ll have a lot of folk to buy for.’

  His brother marched on,hardly giving her a glance.‘Hang on, Angus! Let me introduce you to the young lady who helped save your life!’

  Angus stared at her, his eyes blank and dull as if he had never seen her before. He nodded but said nothing. ‘He doesn’t remember a thing, sadly,’ Guy explained. ‘How are you? Looking forward to Christmas?’

  Selma smiled back, not knowing what to say.