Keep the Home Fires Burning

When Sarah told her aunt this, she snorted in contempt. ‘Stingy old bugger,’ she said. ‘And your mom tells me that although Mrs Jenkins pays you only eight shillings she don’t throw a few groceries in as well to make it up, like.’

Sarah laughed. ‘Oh, Aunt Polly, you must be joking,’ she said. ‘I’m not even allowed to take home the odd cracked egg or stale buns at the end of the day.’

‘I can’t understand the woman at all,’ Polly said, shaking her head. ‘Do you serve in the shop all day?’

‘No,’ Sarah said. ‘My first job when I go in is to bag things up in the storeroom upstairs and send them down the chute to the shop.’

‘Like sugar and that?’

Sarah nodded. ‘And flour, tea and mixed fruit, raisins and that, and anything else Mrs Jenkins wants me to weigh up. She says there’s rationing coming in January so things might be different then, and it might not be so easy to have things under the counter for favoured customers.’

‘I’d say not,’ Marion said. ‘Course, it all depends what’s being rationed.’

‘So do you like the job?’ Polly persisted. ‘Because I heard the last girl left in a tear.’

‘Well, I won’t,’ Sarah said. ‘We need the money too much.’

Neither Polly or Marion argued with that because they knew Sarah was right.

Sarah didn’t moan much, but she did find Mrs Jenkins hard going, and her grating, complaining voice really got on Sarah’s nerves. And Aunt Polly was right: Mrs Jenkins was incredibly mean. She’d give her a cup of weak tea mid-morning, usually when she had finished the bagging up, and another mid-afternoon, but she had to drink these on the shop floor because as soon as she was in the shop Mrs Jenkins made herself scarce. She even seemed to begrudge her the half an hour she gave her to eat the sandwiches Marion put up for her, and there was no cup of tea made then so Sarah usually washed them down with water. However, a job was a job and she thought this would do until something better turned up.

The only cheering thing was that the Government had relaxed the blackout restrictions a little because so many people had been injured or even killed in accidents on the road. Shielded lights on cars were now allowed, and so were shaded torches. It was immensely comforting to have that small pencil of light to guide a person’s way in that dense inky blackness. That was, of course, if batteries could be obtained, for they disappeared from shops quicker than the speed of light.

But then none of this mattered because Bill was coming home on leave. Marion could hardly wait to see him. In a way it was a bittersweet pleasure, because she knew that it was without doubt embarkation leave, and that when he returned he would more than likely be sent overseas to join in the war already claiming many, many lives.

When he arrived that cold, foggy Saturday he was shocked by the state of his family. He noted how thin and pasty-looking the children were, but when he drew Marion into his arms and he could feel her bones, he was shocked to the core.

Marion had a stew ready, made with cow’s heel and vegetables, and because it was Bill’s first night home they were all allowed bread to mop up the gravy, a luxury Marion couldn’t usually allow.

Tony finished his helping, sat back in his chair and said with a sigh of contentment, ‘Crikey, I’d forgotten what it was like to feel really full.’

Tony’s words made Bill feel even worse, and that night in bed beside his wife he said, ‘God, Marion, I am so sorry. I had no idea that you were suffering this way.’

Marion couldn’t reassure Bill and tell him that everything was all right, and yet she felt that she couldn’t berate him either. She wasn’t stupid and she knew that when Bill left her he would be exposed to God alone knew what danger, and she couldn’t let him do that with any angry words that she had thrown at him ringing in his ears. And so she said, ‘We will likely manage well enough if the war doesn’t go on too long.’

‘I hope it doesn’t,’ Bill said. ‘I imagine we’ll be over in France soon and then we’ll know what’s what, and soon have Jerry on the run.’

Marion gave a sudden shiver at Bill’s word and he put his arms around her and held her tight, glad that the bolster had been removed from the bed. Not that he would ever go further than a cuddle, however much he might want to. The doctor had warned him about the danger of another pregnancy after the twins had struggled to be born, and he loved his wife too much to put her at risk. He wasn’t some sex-crazed beast, but to cuddle together was nice and comforting for both of them.

Bill wore his uniform to Mass the next morning as it was the only clothes he had left, but he soon saw that he wasn’t the only one. He found that people respected the uniform and his hand was wrung many times, including by Father McIntyre.

Back home, he ate the thin porridge with everyone else and though he could have eaten three times that amount and still been peckish, he wouldn’t let Marion offer him anything else. After it, to take their mind off how hungry they still were, he suggested taking Tony and the twins down to the canal.

‘Don’t be too long,’ Marion told Bill. ‘I want dinner fairly early because my parents are coming afterwards to see you and they won’t want to go home in the dark.’ She saw his eyes widen and said, ‘They’re not coming for a meal. It takes every penny I have to feed my own. Those fancy Sunday teas are a thing of the past, as I said in my letters to you.’

Bill had no desire to see Clara, but he nodded. ‘We’ll be back in plenty of time.’

The children thoroughly enjoyed having their father back. Tony in particular had really missed him, and in his company he forgot his growling stomach, and the cold of the day, which caused wispy white trails to escape from their mouths when they spoke.

They all knew they were having liver for dinner because Aunt Polly had brought it round the previous day. She’d said the butcher had some going cheap and so she’d bought extra for them.

‘What we eat is sort of hit and miss,’ Marion had told Bill when he’d asked how they were managing. ‘You go to the Bull Ring on Saturday night and buy what is cheap because they are trying to get rid of it. But now Polly has brought liver that’s what we’ll eat.’

‘But I thought Tony and the twins, Magda in particular, hate liver.’

‘Huh,’ said Marion grimly. ‘It’s amazing what you can develop a taste for if the alternative is starving. None of the children can afford to be fussy these days.’

And they weren’t. Bill saw that every plate was soon cleaned.

They had barely washed up before Clara and Eddie Murray were at the door. Eddie was quick to shake Bill’s hand, say he was glad to see him and remarked on how well he was looking. Clara, however, barely returned his greeting before launching into him.

‘Your selfishness in enlisting has reduced your family to penury. They scarcely have enough to live on. You must have noticed how skinny they all are.’

Bill didn’t need it pointing out to him, but Marion was well aware of how he was feeling and she was annoyed with her mother.

‘This really isn’t the time to go into this, Mammy,’ she said. ‘Bill can do nothing now to ease the situation and he just has a couple of days at home. The time for any recriminations at all is well past.’

‘Well said,’ Eddie told his daughter approvingly, and to Bill he said, ‘Shall we leave them to chat and I’ll treat you to a pint? Then you can tell me all about life in the army.’

Bill was glad to get away from the malicious eyes of his mother-in-law. The children wished they could go too, but they had to stay and talk to their grandmother, though most of her conversation was criticising and finding fault with what they said and did.

In the convivial pub, where Bill was greeted by many, Eddie waited until their pints were in front of them before saying, ‘Tell me how life is treating you?’

Bill told him all about the training camp and what he had to do, and Eddie listened with interest.

‘And I suppose the training is over now and this is embarkation leave?’ Eddie asked finally.

‘I imagine so,’ Bill said, ‘though they tell us nothing definite. To be honest it’s the family I worry about. What Clara said today, well, she was right, because I was shocked at the state of them when I came home. Marion made this stew for us all and afterwards young Tony said he had forgotten what it was like to feel full. And you know why that was? It was because, in honour of my coming home, Marion had allowed them bread to mop up the gravy. Usually she can’t afford to do that.’

‘Things have been hard for her,’ Eddie said. ‘Hard for all the wives of servicemen, especially if they’re mothers too, like the vast majority are.’

‘I feel so helpless,’ Bill said. ‘That’s what’s so hard.’

‘Seems to me all that you can do is get over there and finish this war just as soon as you can so life can get back to normal again,’ Eddie said.

Bill smiled wryly. ‘I’ll do my best. As for the family, I saved my cigarette money and had thought to take them to the music hall or cinema for a treat, but I know now a few good feeds is what they really want. Tomorrow early I’m going to the shop to buy extra sugar and full-cream milk for their porridge, and I’ll treat them to a fish-and-chip dinner tomorrow evening. Anything I have got left over I’ll give Marion before I leave.’

‘I would say that they’ll be grateful for that,’ Eddie said.

And they were pleased with the extra sugar and milk on their porridge before they left for school and work the next day.

Bill was shocked to see the younger children dressed in clothes and boots provided by the Christmas Tree Fund, this stamped on them so that they couldn’t be pawned, and he felt shame steal all over him.

Marion saw his face and guessed his feelings. When the children had gone, she said, ‘I felt the same way at the time, and wished that I could have refused them. But how could I have done that? You should see the state of some of their other things, and their warm clothes from last winter won’t go near them now.’

‘I just wish I could make things easier for you,’ Bill said.

‘There is no way you can,’ Marion replied.