Keep the Home Fires Burning

FIVE

Now that the twins had made their First Holy Communion, all the Whittakers went to Communion every Sunday. As no one was allowed to eat or drink beforehand, when they returned from Mass they were usually more than ready for a big feed. However, the first Sunday after Bill had left for the training camp there was no big breakfast. Instead, Marion made a big saucepan full of porridge. It was thin because it was made with water, and there was no jug of creamy milk to pour over it and just one small teaspoon of sugar each.

‘I’m still hungry,’ Tony declared as he cleared his plate.

Magda was as well, but again she had seen the two bright red spots appear in her mother’s cheeks. She was a great respecter of those spots because they would always appear before she got her legs smacked for something or other, so she waited to see what reaction Tony would get.

‘Well then,’ said Marion, ‘you will have to stay hungry until dinner time.’

‘Yeah, but—‘

‘If you have any more now you will have no appetite for dinner.’

‘Yeah I will, Mom,’ Tony cried. ‘Honest. I’m starving.’

‘Starving,’ snorted Marion. ‘You don’t even know what that word means. Anyway, there is no help for it and you will just have to make do with the porridge. No one else is making such a fuss.’

Oh, but I could, Magda thought, for I bet that I’m just as hungry as Tony. There was little point in saying any of this, though, and anyroad, her twin sister, Richard and Sarah seemed satisfied, and Sarah had already started clearing up the bowls.

Sarah could have said that the porridge barely took the edge off her appetite, but she knew that that was the type of meal that they had to get used to when so little money was coming into the house.

Later, in the yard, Magda said to Missie, ‘D’you suppose we’re poor now, ‘cos Mom only gave us two farthings for the collection instead of the two pennies we usually have?’

‘I don’t know if we’re really poor,’ Missie said, ‘but Sarah did tell me that there will be less money about now that Dad has enlisted.’ ‘Oh.’

‘She even said that some weeks we may get no collection money at all.’

‘Well, I’m going round Aunt Polly’s,’ Tony declared. ‘She’ll give me a jam piece or summat when I tell her that I’m still hungry.’

‘You can’t tell Aunt Polly that,’ Missie said, clearly shocked.

‘Why not?’ Tony demanded. ‘It’s the truth.’

‘Because Mom would be hurt if you did,’ Missie explained.

‘She wouldn’t half,’ Magda agreed. ‘Hurt and angry, I’d say. Anyroad, Tony, why d’you think that you’re the only one that’s still hungry? I am as well, if you want to know, but I don’t make as much fuss as you. It’ll be dinner time soon.’

‘Not for flipping hours it won’t.’

‘Oh, stop moaning. It’ll do no good.’

‘I wish Dad was here,’ Tony said wistfully. ‘If he took us down the park or summat I’d probably forget about being hungry.’

‘We all wish Daddy was here,’ Magda said. ‘But it ain’t no good going on about it.’

Tony sighed. Maybe there wasn’t, but there was no way that he was going to stay cooped up in the garden with his kid sisters. ‘Well, I ain’t staying here, anyroad,’ he said. ‘I’m off.’

‘Don’t you dare go to Aunt Polly’s.’

‘I ain’t,’ Tony said, because he knew Magda was right, his mother would be very angry should she find out that he had gone to his aunt’s house to be fed. He had no wish to cope with his mother’s temper as well as starvation. ‘I’m going to find our Jack and have a game of summat.’

When he had gone Magda said, ‘What shall we do? Shall I get our skipping ropes out?’

Missie made a face. Tm bored of skipping.’

‘Tell you what then, let’s see if we can throw two balls at the wall like our Sarah can?’

‘She can do three,’ Missie corrected. ‘I’ve seen her. I have trouble enough doing one.’

‘And me, but Sarah says practice makes perfect.’

‘If you like then,’ Missie said. ‘I don’t care what we do really.’

Magda sighed as she looked at her twin sister. ‘This is probably what being at war’s like,’ she said, ‘and our Sarah says we have to put up with it like everyone else.’

‘I know,’ Missie replied heavily. ‘It’s just everything’s so strange, and I do miss Daddy. But go and get the balls and we’ll see what we can play.’

However, the whole flavour of the day was wrong. Eventually the girls were called in for dinner. Magda sniffed because she loved the smells that would waft through from the kitchen on Sundays: the succulent aroma of a large piece of meat roasting slowly in the oven, surrounded by golden brown potatoes, and there might be apple crumble or treacle sponge bubbling away on the shelf below.

That day, however, she was in for an unpleasant shock for there was no roasting meat and golden brown potatoes and no pudding at all.

Marion didn’t know how long it would be before she had some more money coming in and she had been horrified at the price of meat, which had rocketed up since war had been declared, though no one could give a satisfactory reason as to why this was. So she made a casserole with a small piece of beef she had diced so that it would cook quicker and filled the pot with vegetables.

Usually, while the dinner was cooking Marion would be hard at it making pastries, pies and sponge cakes for Sunday tea, and by the time the dinner was ready there would normally be some of these cooling on wire trays. But Marion knew those teas would be a thing of the past. She had explained it all to her parents, though when she told them of the pittance that she was being given to feed the family they could understand that for themselves.

Everyone was too hungry to grumble about the casserole that day, though, and so they ate it without complaint.

Later Magda said to Missie, ‘It’s great that we haven’t got Grandma Murray to put up with today, ain’t it?’ Missie agreed it was and Magda went on, ‘Maybe Grandma and Granddad will never be able to come again. That would be even better.’

‘Not half,’ Missie agreed. ‘I don’t mind Granddad, though.’

‘I don’t either,’ Magda conceded. ‘He couldn’t come on his own, though. But what’s really smashing is the thought of never having to sit on that blooming horsehair sofa ever again.’

Bill Whittaker had been gone just over a week and they had just received the first letter from him, telling them how he’d settled down in the camp, when Polly came around with news of her own. Only the twins were in the house with their mother because Sarah was shopping and Tony playing out in the street.

‘Oh, Marion, what do you think?’ Aunt Polly said as she came in, her eyes aglow. ‘Our Pat has been offered a fine job at the munitions works at Witton and the wage is six pounds a week.’

Magda, glancing at her mother, knew that she wasn’t overpleased at Pat’s good fortune because her mouth had gone all tight. She shooed the girls into the garden but they lingered in the scullery.

‘I don’t understand why Mom’s so cross about Uncle Pat getting a job,’ Magda said in a low voice. ‘I mean, for years she has been moaning about the fact he doesn’t have one.’

Missie gave a little sigh. ‘I know. I think grownups are really confusing.’

‘Six pounds a week?’ they heard their mother exclaim. ‘What in God’s name does Pat know about making explosives?’

‘Enough, seemingly,’ Polly said. ‘Oh God, Marion, what does anyone know about anything these days? When did you think that you would ever see woman drivers and conductors on the trams, or working alongside men in the factories? The world has been turned on its head and I suppose Pat will be trained like all the rest. Anyroad,’ she added with a touch of pride, ‘they must think he had something about him because he only went for a job in the factory, like, and when he said as how he failed his medical to get in the army because of his flat feet they offered him the job as foreman.’

‘Sarah was right,’ Missie whispered. ‘It was just flat feet after all.’

‘Well, I hope it stays fine for you,’ the twins heard their mother say in a sort of clipped voice. Then she added, ‘Have you time to stay for a cup of tea?’

‘I shouldn’t,’ Polly said. ‘And I can’t stay too long, but I will have a quick cup because we haven’t had a good old natter for ages.’

‘Out, quick,’ Magda said, pushing Missie in front of her, and they escaped to the garden before their mother would catch them eavesdropping.

Later that night, when the house was still, Marion admitted to herself that she couldn’t be really happy for her sister’s good fortune, just incredibly envious. Polly had been poor all her married life and now she would have plenty of money, at least as long as the war lasted, while she, Marion, would have to scrimp and scrape. It was her husband who was putting his life on the line, not Polly’s. She found it very hard not to feel resentful.

Clara quite understood how Marion felt when she next came round.

‘It hardly seems fair that my Bill will soon be risking his life daily for a pittance,’ Marion said to her mother, ‘and because Pat Reilly is not fit for that, he’s sitting pretty and earning a wage many would give their eyeteeth for.’

‘I know,’ Clara said. ‘And all this came about because they said he had flat feet. I ask you! If they had refused him because he had chronic liver failure, I could have understood it more. Anyroad, Marion, just imagine how bad the others after jobs were for Pat Reilly to be the best of them.’

Marion gave a grim smile. ‘I thought that too.’

‘And, of course, Pat’s fine wages will do them no good at all,’ Clara said. ‘It will just dribble through Polly’s fingers.’

Marion thought that a little unfair, for Polly was always very good with money, but she didn’t say anything because for once her mother seemed to understand how aggrieved she had felt at her sister’s good fortune. ‘And just think, with extra money at his disposal, Pat Reilly could easily drink himself into an early grave. Mind you, in his case that could be a blessing.’

‘Oh, Mam!’ Marion said, shocked.

‘Don’t tell me you haven’t thought the same, for I’ll not believe it.’

A crimson flush flooded Marion’s face because her mother was right, though she felt so ashamed of it. ‘Bill always said there wasn’t that much wrong with Pat,’ she ventured.

‘There is a great deal wrong with a man who takes a young girl down and fills her belly every year without any idea how he is going to provide for any of his kids. They have lived like paupers.’

They had, as Marion knew only too well, so why then couldn’t she take joy in the fact that life was going to be easier for them from now on? That she couldn’t disturbed her because she realised she was not half as generous as her sister, who didn’t seem to have a resentful bone in her body.

As one week followed another no bombs fell and the only sign that Britain was at war at all was the news of ships being sunk, and everyone trying to cope with the blackout. Those who could, stayed indoors when darkness fell because to venture out was risking life and limb in such inky blackness.

The Government advised people to paint white lines on the kerbs outside their houses, and around any trees, pillar boxes and lampposts to try to cut down on the number of accidents.

‘It won’t work, of course,’ Polly said. ‘The white paint won’t show up in the pitch black any more than any other colour would.’

‘I know,’ Marion said. ‘It’s stupid, and so was sending the kids away when we’ve had no bombs. A lot of mothers like Phyllis Cox are bringing them back home.’

‘Don’t blame them.’

‘Nor do I. But I wish they would organise something for the children left behind. It does no good for kids to be hanging about all the time. It only leads to mischief when they have too much time on their hands.’

‘Oh, I’ll say so,’ Polly said. ‘Gladys Kent complained about our Jack only the other day. She has a house that opens on to the street and the little bugger tied her knocker in such a way that he could operate it from a distance. Course, when she tried to open the door she couldn’t. She said she knew it was him because she heard him killing himself laughing behind the wall.’

‘Was Tony involved as well?’

‘Think so.’

‘Why didn’t you come and tell me?’

‘It was only a prank, Marion,’ Polly said. ‘Pat gave them both a good talking to and they won’t do it again.’

‘I miss Bill for that,’ Marion said. ‘He was always so good with Tony over something like that. Mind, I miss Bill for more than just that, and though he includes postal orders in his letters he hasn’t much to spare either. I am so worried about money because it’s five weeks now since Bill left, with no sign of any Separation Allowance from the Government. Each morning when I wake I feel as if I’ve a lump of lead in my stomach when I think of the day ahead and trying to feed hungry children on a pittance. I mean, Bill left me ten pounds but twelve shillings a week for the rent makes a big hole in that.’

‘But there is no reason for you or the nippers to go without,’ Polly said. ‘I’ve told you many a time. We have the money now and, God knows, you’ve helped me and mine enough in the past. Why are you so pig-headed?’

‘Polly, if I had money from you, I haven’t the least idea when I would ever be able to pay you back.’

‘Have I ever asked for you to pay me back?’ Polly said, exasperated by her sister’s stubbornness.

‘I would have to pay you back,’ Marion said. ‘It’s the way I am.’

‘Have you managed to pay the rent?’

‘Marion made a face. ‘No, not for the last week I didn’t, and I can’t see it being any better this week, or next either.’

‘You’ll have to pay summat off soon,’ Polly warned. ‘Some of these landlords only give you three or four weeks, especially in posh houses like these.’

‘Polly, don’t you think that I’m not panic-stricken about just that?’ Marion snapped. ‘But I can’t magic money out of the air.’

‘Well,’ said Polly, ‘if you’re adamant that you won’t accept help from me, listen to this. I was talking to a woman down our yard and she said that her old man joined up in the spring because, like Pat, he hadn’t ever really had what you’d call regular work, and she told me that they dain’t get her Separation Allowance sorted out for over two months.’

‘Oh God!’ Marion cried. ‘If that happens to me I will be out on my ear. It would be the workhouse for the lot of us.’

‘Don’t be so bloody soft,’ Polly said. ‘Me and Pat would never let that happen to you or the nippers. Anyroad, what I’m trying to tell you is there is somewhere you can go, some organisation that helps in situations like this. This woman was telling me all about it, ‘cos she was on her beam ends, she said, and she had to go and see them.’

‘Beam ends,’ Marion said, ‘I know how that feels all right. And did this place help her?’

‘Yeah,’ Polly said. ‘You can’t go every week or owt to top up your Separation Allowance, for all you might need it, but if they are taking their time sorting out what you are due, they’ll help you. It’s called the SSAFA, which stands for Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen and Families Association and they have a big office place on Colmore Row. I’ll go with you tomorrow if you like.’

‘Oh, Polly, would you really?’

‘Course I would, you daft sod,’ Polly said cheerfully. ‘In things like this you are like a babe in arms, our Marion.’

Polly had advised her to take her marriage lines, the kids’ birth certificates and her rent book with her. ‘They don’t know who you are, do they?’ she said. ‘I mean, you could be just someone come in off the street trying to get money they ain’t entitled to.’

Marion knew that her sister was right. She took all the details of the Royal Warwickshires, the regiment in which Bill had enlisted, and even took the three letters that he had sent her from the training camp. A woman came out to see her where she waited on the wooden bench in the reception hall to which she had been directed, and Marion was a little unnerved by her smartness. She wore a pink, high-necked frilled blouse and navy skirt, proper silk seamed stockings and high-heeled navy shoes. She had also used cosmetics on her face and her light-coloured hair was gathered up in a very neat bun at the base of her neck. Marion followed her into a small office with some trepidation.

However, the woman’s eyes were kind and she was very understanding when Marion explained the difficulties she was having. When she had filled in the claim form she was awarded an interim payment of fifteen shillings to tide her over to the next week.

‘And then what?’ Marion asked.

‘If your Separation Allowance is not worked out by that time, you must come back,’ the woman said. ‘We will continue to help you till the Government steps in.’

‘I am most grateful.’

‘These are hard times for everyone,’ the woman said. ‘But the one thing many of our servicemen are worried about are the families they have left behind. We try to help to relieve some of that stress for you and your children, and also for your husband.’

‘She’s right as well, ain’t she?’ Polly said as they made their way home and Marion told her what the woman had said. ‘I think that our soldiers and sailors and that have enough to worry about facing the enemy without worrying about how their families are faring.’

Marion nodded. ‘And she was such a kind and sympathetic woman.’

‘Yeah,’ Polly said. ‘The bit I saw of her she seemed genuine enough, for all she was a bit posh, like. I think they’re all volunteers ? that’s what the woman down the yard said, anyroad. Too rich to need paying for a job like normal folk.’

‘I don’t care who they are,’ Marion said. ‘They have saved my bacon for this week at least, and some of this is going to pay off my rent arrears.’

‘Yeah, that’s sensible,’ Polly said. ‘But keep some back.’

‘Don’t worry,’ Marion said. ‘I need to buy coal – we’re nearly all out. I will give the rent man the least amount I can get away with.’

Despite the help Marion received from the SSAFA, the rent man pressed her for more money than she wanted to pay, and with the coal bought there was very little left.

‘Go back,’ Polly advised, when she popped around to see Marion. ‘Tell them what you had to pay out.’

Marion shook her head.’I couldn’t. I would be that ashamed, but I am down to my last shilling.’

‘Well,’ said Polly, ‘the only way to get quick cash is to pawn summat.’

Marion felt as if a lead weight had landed in the pit of her stomach and she remembered her boast that she had never crossed the doorstep of a pawnbroker’s. She felt tears of shame and humiliation prickle the back of her eyes but she brushed them away impatiently. There was no allowing herself the luxury of tears.

‘And what should I pawn?’ she asked.

‘Well, you can start with the old man’s clothes,’ Polly said. ‘Most women in your position would have pawned his suit before he’d passed the end of the street.’

Marion was aghast. ‘I can’t do that.’

‘Course you can,’ Polly said dismissively. ‘He’ll not be wanting his stuff at the Front, will he? Anyroad, it’s his fault that you’re in this mess.’

Marion remembered the day that Bill had bought that suit. In the Bull Ring a two-piece suit cost two guineas; a three-piece, two pounds and ten shillings.

‘He wanted the waistcoat so that he could wear his watch,’ Marion told Polly, laying it out on the bed.

Polly extracted the watch from the waistcoat pocket. ‘Good watch, that.’

‘It’s gold,’ Marion said. ‘It was Bill’s father’s and Bill is almighty fond of it.’

Polly shrugged. ‘Might have to go despite that,’ she said. ‘But it would be better to take that in on its own, not mixed in with a pile of clothes. That way you’ll probably get more for it. Now, what about his second-best suit that this one replaced?’

‘No,’ Marion said. ‘I was going to cut it down for Richard – he’s fast growing out of the one he has now – and any extra material I was going to save to patch Tony’s trousers. He goes through the seat of those more often than I have hot dinners, and I’ll not send him to school like some poor souls with their bottoms nearly exposed.’

‘All right, we’ll leave the second-best suit and the watch for now,’ Polly said, pulling out more of Bill’s clothes to lay on the bed.’This is a sizeable bundle anyway.’

‘I’m really nervous,’ Marion said.’I’ve never been in a pawnbroker’s before.’

‘You’re luckier than most round these doors then.’

‘Not these doors,’ Marion corrected.’You never see anyone here taking a bundle to be pawned on Monday morning.’

‘Yeah, well, maybe none of their husbands thought it their duty to fight for King and Country to try and protect the rest of us,’ Polly said.’And while they’re doing that the bloody Government think a few measly shillings a week is all a woman needs to feed and clothe her family and keep them warm.

‘Now,’ Polly said as the two women left the house, ‘I usually go to Sarah Moore, but she can be a mean bugger, so we’ll try Jones on the corners of Wheeler Street and Clifford Street. He’s a bit stern-looking ? is a retired JP, I heard – but he is fair.’

Marion had always had an assumption that pawn shops were dark and rather seedy places but she was pleasantly surprised because Jones looked quite respectable from the outside. She had a surreptitious look round to see if anyone she knew was watching her before she went in the door, feeling sick to her soul that she had to part with Bill’s clothes in such a way in order for them all to survive.