Tuppence To Spend (48 page)

He might be just in time to catch the same train as Tim and Keith and the girls. And if not, there’d be another one along soon. There was bound to be.

Dan Hodges arrived home on Tuesday evening. The minesweeper he’d been working on had developed a fault in its engine and he’d had to go to sea with it. Then it had been deployed to deal with several suspected mines off the Isle of Wight, with no time for Dan to be put ashore. He’d been half expecting it, but that didn’t make his temper any better and by the time he arrived home he was tired and irritable. The only bright spot in the dreary, never-ending round of toil was that Sammy would be there waiting for him.

He walked up the back garden path, noting with approval that there was no light showing. The nipper had had the sense to put up the blackout then, unless he’d never actually taken it down. Dan hoped he hadn’t been sitting in the dark all this time and for the first time he wondered how Sammy had managed without him. Well, he ought to have been all right. There’d been food in the house and money for some more, and it wasn’t the first time the kid had had to fend for himself. Dan himself had had to manage when he was the same age.

He pushed open the back door. It was cold in the scullery, but then it always was. He pulled the door shut and struck a match to light the gas.

The door to the back room was open. There was no light on in there and it was just as cold as the scullery. Slowly, Dan moved into the room and lit the gas there as well. He looked around the room.

It had a cold, empty look about it, as if no one had been
there for days. The table was bare, except for an empty milk bottle and a cup. The paper chains drooped forlornly from their strings. The game of Sorry had gone, and the jigsaw puzzle was back in its box.

Dan moved over to the fireplace. The fire had been laid but not lit. On the mantelpiece he found his own ration book, lying by itself. There was no sign either of Sammy’s book or the three shillings he had left to buy food.

Dan stared at the dusty shelf. He felt behind the black marble clock that had belonged to Nora’s parents, but found only a gas bill. He looked at the candlesticks, one at each end, as if they could tell him something. He turned and stared around the room again as if he expected to see Sammy hiding behind a chair, ready to jump out with a laugh on his face.

The room was still empty. In fact, it felt even emptier and much, much colder.

‘He’s gone,’ Dan said slowly. ‘He’s gone and left me. He’s took his ration book and the money and his Christmas presents and everything, and just buggered off. And I know where to, as well. And I’m bloody sure I know who took him!’

He turned on his heel and stamped out through the door leading to the passage. He went out through the front, leaving the door swinging open, not caring about whether light might be showing or not, and stormed down April Grove to hammer loudly on the door of number 14.

‘Come out here, Frank Budd!’ he yelled. ‘Come out here, and tell me what you done with my boy. He was all right – we were
both
all right. We had a good Christmas. He was going to stop with me, with his dad, where he belongs. You come out here and tell me just what right you had to take my boy away from me, and come out quick before I breaks this bloody door right down!’

The door opened slowly and Frank Budd stood there. The two men glared at each other. They were both big men
and a fight between them could have been a nasty affair. But Frank Budd was no fighter, for all he’d taught his boys to box, and he simply stood there, unmoving, staring at Dan until finally Dan quietened down.

‘What in the name of God’s all this shouting about?’ he demanded sternly. ‘What do you mean, what have I done with your boy? I haven’t done nothing with him. I haven’t even seen him since Saturday afternoon, when he come down here and had his tea with us. If you ask me, Dan Hodges, it’s what
you
done with him that we all ought to be asking. He’s your boy and it don’t seem to us that you’ve been looking after him at all. So whatever’s happened, it’s
your
fault – not mine.’

Dan stared at him. ‘You haven’t seen him since Saturday?’

‘That’s what I said.’

‘But – but it’s
Tuesday
now.’

‘I know,’ Frank said. ‘And it seems to me that what you’re saying is that you’ve left that nipper on his own for nearly four days. That’s neglect, that is. You could go to court for that.’

‘Never mind that,’ Dan said, a note of panic creeping into his voice. ‘The point is, where is he? And how long’s he been gone? I thought he must have gone back to Bridge End with you.’

Frank shook his head. ‘I told you, we ain’t seen him. At least, I haven’t. I dunno about Jess.’ He called over his shoulder and Jess came to the door and stood beside him. Her eyes widened when she heard that Dan didn’t know where Sammy was and she looked at her husband in dismay.

‘But I went up there on Sunday evening to see him into bed and then I went again yesterday. When I saw he wasn’t there, I thought he must be in with the Vickerses. Freda said she’d keep an eye on him and I reckoned she must have decided he ought to be in the house with them.’ She
put her hand to her mouth. ‘I meant to go in again this morning, but our Annie came down and told me Mum was poorly with flu and I’ve been up and down to them ever since. Oh dear, whatever’s happened to him? That poor little boy …’

‘Now, don’t start getting in a state,’ Frank said quickly. ‘The chances are he’s taken himself off back to Bridge End. I dare say he’s there now, sitting beside Mrs Purslow’s fire and having a hot cup of cocoa before he goes to bed. She probably thinks you sent him back, Dan.’

‘Well, how can I find out?’ Dan asked desperately. ‘It’s too late to send a telegram now.’

‘Ring up the vicar,’ Jess said with sudden inspiration. ‘He’s got a telephone. You can ring from the box at the top of the street – I do it sometimes, to talk to the boys. He’ll be able to tell you if Sammy’s back with Mrs Purslow.’

She ran back indoors to scribble down the number and Dan marched swiftly to the telephone box at the top of October Street. He asked the operator to connect him and pushed his money into the box.

‘Well, I haven’t heard that Sammy’s come back,’ the vicar said doubtfully when at last they were connected. ‘But he might have done. I’ll go along and find out. Can you telephone me again in about half an hour?’

Half an hour. Dan stood uncertainly outside the telephone box. He might as well go home, make a cup of tea. He was hungry too – he’d been hoping that Sammy would have thought to put a couple of spuds in the oven for their supper. After a moment he went into the fish and chip shop and bought a pennyworth of chips and a piece of cod. He could eat that straight out of the newspaper and then come back up to the phone box again.

The half-hour seemed more like three days. He ate the fish and chips quickly and drank a cup of tea while standing at the table. Then he set off again for the phone box, waiting impatiently outside for a young woman to finish a
call to her boyfriend. She came out at last and he pushed his way past her.

He’d had time during the past half-hour to think of any amount of things that might have happened to Sammy. Suppose he hadn’t gone back to Bridge End at all. Suppose someone had got into the house and kidnapped him, taking his ration book and the money as well. Suppose he’d been run over – got lost – fallen into the sea …

‘Is that you, Mr Hodges?’ The vicar’s voice sounded sharp and anxious in his ear and Dan felt his heart lurch.

‘Yes. Yes, it’s me. I couldn’t get in before, there was some silly girl … Is he there, Mr Beckett? Is he back with Mrs Purslow? Is he all right, is my boy all right?’

There was a pause. It seemed to Dan that the vicar was never going to reply. Then the voice came again, heavy with the tone of one who doesn’t want to deliver bad news.

‘I’m sorry, Mr Hodges, he’s not. Ruth Purslow hasn’t seen or heard of him since you took him home on Christmas Eve. Nobody in the village has.’ There was another pause and then a deep sigh. ‘Wherever Sammy is, Mr Hodges, he hasn’t come back to Bridge End.’

Jane and George were just settling down to listen to the nine o’clock news. Like everyone else, they were desperately anxious about what was happening in the Far East. Since Pearl Harbour a whole new war seemed to have been unleashed, with British possessions as well as American in peril. Hong Kong had fallen on Christmas Day itself, the Philippines were under threat and the Japanese seemed to be marching through the whole of Malaya, right down to Singapore itself. Everyone was aware that the threat was not just against the Far East, terrible though that would be. Australia itself, one of Britain’s favourite colonies, whose men were already far from their own homes, fighting on Britain’s behalf, would be next in line for Japanese invasion.

Nor was that all. The north Atlantic convoy, including
Alec’s ship, was being attacked daily by U-boats, which seemed to come from nowhere. The great city of Leningrad was still under siege, with thousands dying in the streets every day. And it was the same everywhere – in Africa, Norway, Burma, Siam, a war was being fought so cruel that there had never been its like in all history, and so bitter that nobody could see its end.

‘It’s just awful,’ Jane said when the news came to an end at last and the warm, north-country tones of J. B. Priestley took over with his ‘Notes’. ‘You just can’t imagine it, can you, all the world fighting like that? How did it happen, George? How did we get into this? I mean, all we wanted to do was stop Hitler marching into Poland. I just can’t understand how it’s spread like this.’

George took his pipe from his mouth. ‘I know, love. But the way I see it, war’s like a car that’s got a starting-handle but no brakes. And it’s running downhill. There’s nothing anyone can do to stop it till it gets to the bottom.’

‘And then it’ll crash,’ Jane said quietly. ‘And what sort of a world is going to be left after that?’

George shook his head as if he had no answer. But before he could speak there was a loud hammering on the kitchen door and Ruth burst in, her eyes wild, her coat dragged on anyhow and her hair flying. She came to a stop, staring at them both, and leant one hand heavily on the table, pressing the other against her side.

‘Ruth!’ Jane was on her feet. ‘Heavens above, whatever is it?’

George dropped his pipe. He too lumbered to his feet. ‘Sit down, girl. You look as if you’ve seen a ghost. What’s happened?’

Breathless from the run from her cottage all the way to the farm, Ruth stared at them. She shook her head, almost gulping for breath, then blurted out, ‘It’s Sammy – Jane, Sammy’s missing! Nobody knows where he is.’

‘Sammy? Here, sit down.’ Jane pressed her sister down
into a chair. ‘Now, get your breath back and then tell us. George, push the kettle over, will you? Now, love, what’s all this about? Sammy’s in Portsmouth with his dad, surely. How can he be missing?’

Ruth shook her head. She felt up the sleeve of her cardigan for a hanky and rubbed it across her wet face. ‘He’s not. That’s just it. He’s not in Portsmouth and his dad doesn’t know where he is. Nobody’s seen him since Monday morning.’ She raised frantic eyes to her sister. ‘He could have been missing for nearly two whole days, and nobody even knew he’d gone.’

Jane and George looked at each other, nonplussed. Jane gave Ruth’s arm a squeeze and went to make the tea. She looked back over her shoulder. ‘I don’t understand. How could his dad not know he’s been missing? And how have you come to hear about it?’

‘Well, they thought he’d come out to Bridge End. I mean, where else would he go? And so Dan – Mr Hodges – he rang up the vicar to see if he knew anything. And Mr Beckett came down to me himself and told me the poor little boy had gone, left the house while his dad was at sea. Took his ration book and some money, and his bits and pieces – the presents I put in his stocking and the game of Sorry and all – and just went. And they thought he must be trying to get out here, but he hasn’t arrived, Jane. And there’s no more trains tonight, so where is he?
Where is he
?’ Her voice rose in a wail and she covered her face with her hands, sobbing as if her heart would break.

Jane gave George another swift glance.

‘I still don’t understand why they don’t know how long he’s been gone,’ she said when Ruth’s sobs diminished a little and she was able to sip the tea Jane put in front of her. ‘I mean, surely he was there this morning when his dad went to work—’

‘That’s just it. I don’t know all the ins and outs of it, Jane, but it seems Mr Hodges went to work on Saturday
morning and never came back till today. He works on ships, you see, small ones like minesweepers and things, and he often has to go out with them for a day or two to see that the engines are working right. Well, he went off on Saturday, and Tim Budd says Sammy went down to tea with them that afternoon, and apparently the woman next door said she’d keep an eye on him if there was a raid, and he was there Monday morning all right because Tim and Keith have told Mr Beckett they saw him when they were on their way to the station and gave him a wave – but nobody’s seen him since. The woman next door said she thought Dan had changed his mind and sent him off with the others, and Mr Budd got home late that evening and went off to work early next morning and he’s been working overtime today, only got home about eight o’clock. So until Dan came home tonight, nobody knew Sammy was missing.’ She stared at Jane, her eyes wide with fear. ‘He could have been gone ever since yesterday morning. Oh Jane, where is he? Wherever is he?’

Jane stared at her helplessly. ‘Oh, Ruth. That’s dreadful.’ She looked at her husband. ‘What should we do, George? We can’t just sit here and do nothing.’

‘Well, we can’t go out looking for him neither. Not at this time of night, with the blackout and all. We don’t even know where to start.’ He lifted his hands helplessly. ‘Seems to me the best thing we can do is go and see the vicar and see what he thinks. Maybe those other children will know something. Then we’ll have some idea what to do tomorrow. I suppose it’ll have to be reported to the authorities – the billeting people, maybe even the police.’