Anne Bennett - Keep the Home Fires Burning

‘Oh, they were there, all right,’ the priest said. ‘And afterwards showed total disrespect for the Church and the sacrament they had just taken part in.’

‘What did they do, Father?’ Marion asked fearfully.

‘They each had a water pistol and I caught them filling them up from the holy water font.’

‘Oh, Father!’ cried Marion, shocked. ‘I’m so sorry.’

‘It’s not your place to be sorry,’ the priest said. ‘It’s up to your son to be sorry and mend his ways. Jack Reilly admitted that both pistols were his and that he had given one to Tony.’

‘Somehow Tony seems to lose all sense of right and wrong when he’s with that boy,’ Marion said. ‘I will deal with him, Father never fear. Where is he?’

‘Knowing that your husband is away, I have taken them both to Pat Reilly’s house to let him deal with the pair of them.’

‘Thank you, Father,’ Marion said. ‘I will be away now to fetch Tony home.’

And she did fetch him and berated him every step of the way. That night she wrote to tell Bill all about his recalcitrant son.

Not surprisingly, Pat didn’t take it at all seriously. Do you know, he even asked the boys if they had chosen holy water because it improved their aim …

Bill smiled when he read that because he could well imagine Pat saying it, and knew he himself would have taken the same line and viewed it for what it was, a boyhood prank. He also knew that Marion would never see it like that. She was really upset over it.

How is Jack to grow up with any sort of moral fibre with a father like that one as an example? And whatever mischief he is at, Tony is right behind him. I cannot seem to keep any sort of check on him and never know what he might be up to next.

A week after the last upset with Tony, Marion pawned the silver locket Bill had bought her the year after they were married and the delicate chiming carriage clock that had been Lady Amelia’s present to her when she’d left service to marry Bill. It had pride of place on the mantelpiece in the parlour for it was easily the most beautiful thing the family owned. Marion shed bitter tears when she was alone for she hated having to part with such treasured items.

Sarah missed the clock almost straight away, but she said nothing because she could see from her mother’s sad face and woebegone eyes that she was heart sore that she’d had to take it to the pawnbroker. When her grandparents had been coming to tea every Sunday, one of the jobs that Sarah did on a Saturday was to dust the parlour. She used to dust that clock with very great care indeed, always afraid that she might drop it or damage it in some other way. Now she thought the mantelpiece looked terribly bare without it.

And so it did, but Marion needed the money. She was a week behind with the rent again, badly needed coal, and she would liked to have her leaky boots resoled. Also she wanted to pick up a trinket for the children for Christmas, which was only two weeks away. She knew that it would be a poor one for the family this year, with no presents and nothing in the way of festive food either. She made a bit of an effort, though, and brought the little Christmas tree down from the loft, and hung around the garlands the children had made over the years.

Sarah knew the twins still firmly believed in Santa Claus, though she wasn’t sure about Tony, and she thought she had better warn them about the lack of presents. ‘Santa won’t be visiting us this year,’ she told them one evening.

They all looked at her in amazement. Tony wasn’t sure that he believed in Santa any more. Jack said it was eyewash and it was just your parents filled your stockings and that, but though he usually accepted everything Jack said as gospel truth, Tony had held on to the belief that this time he was wrong and that his bulging stockings of the past had been filled by a genial man in a red suit and sporting a long white beard.

At Sarah’s words he saw at once that that wasn’t so. Jack had been right all along and that the hunting knife that he had coveted for so long would not be in his possession by Boxing Day, this year anyway.

‘Why ever not?’ asked Magda.

‘It’s because of the war,’ Sarah said.

Magda and Missie looked at one another. They knew all about the war, but that surely had nothing to do with Santa. ‘What about the war?’

‘Well, if he set off with a sleigh full of toys the Germans could capture him,’ Sarah said.

The twins’ mouths dropped agape at that terribly shocking news. They knew how horrid the Germans were because the adults were always talking about it and what they got up to, and the girls often saw the headlines of newspapers on their way to school. So Santa in German hands didn’t bear thinking about. What if they hurt him, killed him, even? Magda thought she wouldn’t put it past them. They were as bad as it was possible to be.

So when Sarah said, ‘He thought this year he is safer staying where he is at the North Pole,’ the twins nodded solemnly. They were disappointed, but keeping Santa safe was paramount in their minds.

Marion had in the end taken the five shillings that Polly had pressed upon her so that the children could eat well on Christmas Day. To give the twins at least something to open Christmas morning she also got the two girls a couple of wind-up toys from a man in the Bull Ring selling them from a tray round his neck, but she could find nothing for Tony, and neither could Sarah and Richard. They all felt bad about that.

Then after breakfast on Christmas Day, Richard dropped a cloth bag into his young brother’s hands. ‘Happy Christmas, Tony.’

Tony’s mouth dropped open with astonishment. ‘Your marble collection,’ he said with awe, his voice choked with emotion, because it was the one thing that he had coveted for ages, which Richard would never let him touch.

Richard knew better than to comment on Tony’s reaction and instead he said almost nonchalantly, ‘You may as well have them. I never play with them any more.’

Tony tipped them out onto the table and examined them. He knew he’d be the envy of his friends when he hit the streets with those. Not even Jack had so many, or such fine ones.

‘Thanks, Richard,’ he said. ‘I’ll take real good care of them.’

Marion was glad that for Tony and the twins, a little magic of the day was retained.

After dinner Polly came around with a bundle of clothes for them all. She had a warm coat for Tony that she said was an old one of Jack’s, but Marion had never seen Jack wearing anything like it and it was rather big for Tony. However, before she was able to say anything at all, Tony exclaimed in delight and put it on, very glad to have it because the only coat that fitted him was very thin and did nothing to keep the cold out.

‘This is great,’ he said, and Marion saw his eyes were shining so, though her eyes met her sister’s over Tony’s head, she said nothing.

There were also scarves, gloves and smart berets for the twins, and a smart cap with ear flaps, the same brown as the coat, for Tony. Polly even had a couple of dresses and a cardigan for Marion she said she had no use for. Marion was moved to tears by her sister’s kindness and generosity. When she tried to say this, however, Polly waved her thanks away almost impatiently.

‘Think nothing of it. How many times did you help me out?’

‘That was nothing,’ Marion said. ‘It was just a bit and, anyway, I didn’t do it so you would feel you had to pay it back.’

‘And I didn’t do it for that, like a kind of duty,’ Polly said. ‘You made life much more comfortable for me and mine for years and years.’ She put her hand over Marion’s. ‘Now, through no fault of yours or mine, the positions have reversed a bit. It pleases me to be able to help you. Let me do it while I have the means to do so.’