Chapter 75: Epilogue

On the third, and final evening of his visit to Lancaster in 1983, Michael Watson telephoned and arranged to meet his old friend Rob. Paul Howson was living in Australia, and he had not seen him for five years but Rob had never moved very far from the Lancaster area. He lived near Millom, in Cumbria, and came down willingly to Lancaster by car to see Michael.

They'd always remained friends, ever since the day they'd met in the park when they were infants. Usually, Rob went to Norfolk and spent a week with Michael and his family every summer. Michael's visits to Rob were infrequent because Michael's wife strongly disapproved of his old friend. She wished she could stop Rob from coming to see them.

"He bosses you about," she'd say. "He has a a funny attitude to life. Thinks he knows everything. What's more, I know he doesn't like me."

Michael thought his wife saw Rob as a threat. He had been married four times. After his father Jack died, he'd inherited a lot of money and never worked again. That was more than twenty years ago, since when he'd led a carefree existence; the only barriers to what he did to enjoy himself were the limitations of his imagination. To an extent, Michael envied him but he also felt sorry for him. Rob had never been able to settle. He'd never had anything like a responsible attitude. He'd never had to, and didn't want to, take care of anything or anybody.

"Life's about pleasing yourself," he'd say. "I never do anybody any harm." His was a blinkered existence.

During the twenty years of their marriage, Michael's wife had worked hard to ensure her husband was a reformed character. Before he'd met her, he had been into all sorts of dubious dealings and semi-crooked activities. He and Rob had been in a number of scrapes together.

In Lancaster, with no wife around, Michael was looking forward to a really good night out with Rob. They were going pub-crawling, before returning to the Castle Hotel. Rob had decided to stay there overnight, rather than drink and then drive back to Millom.

Rob arrived promptly at seven o'clock. He was ageing well, despite his debauchery. He was tall, well-built and walked with a swagger. He came in through the front entrance. Michael was waiting for him at the bar, looking out for him. They shook hands.

"Hello Rob! Nice of you to come all this way. Pint of bitter?"
"Hello mate! Glad to be here! Yes please." Rob looked around. "Not exactly the Ritz is it?"
"Suits me fine! I had a good time in here last night with the locals. Met a couple of blokes who used to work with the old man, at Williamson's. Your dad would have enjoyed it."
"Oh yeah! He loved to wear a hair shirt. Miserable sod!"
"Go on! He wasn't a bad sort really. He did all right by you in the end, didn't he?"
"You could say that. Eventually! Anyway, I'm damned glad to see you. Where's your minder? She let you off the hook for once? Into your second adolescence yet?"

"Never mind mine! Where's yours? Have you got one? Or are you still looking for Miss Perfection?"
"No such thing! Never found one yet who knew when to open her legs and keep her mouth shut!"

The landlady heard what Rob said and was frowning at him. Michael noticed and told Rob to watch what he was saying.

"Quite right!" he said to Michael. "Only joking, love!" He smiled at the landlady. "Anyway, Mike, what are you doing here in the old town, all on your own?"
Lancaster had been a city since 1937 but the label 'town' still stuck.

"My dad died recently, and it seemed a good idea to have a few days round here where I was brought up. Kind of a memory-lane kick."
"So Gordon's dead, why didn't you let me know? I'd have come to the funeral."
"When you're dead, you're dead. Honour the living I say. The dead can look after themselves. They haven't much choice have they?"

He didn't say that his wife hadn't wanted Rob at the funeral.
"My! My! We are getting cynical in our old age aren't we?"

They finished their pint in the Castle Hotel and then rang for a taxi, to take them to the George, at Torrisholme.

They didn't talk much on the way. Gordon remembered how their two fathers had been friends too. And so different in their ways.

Gordon had come back from the war, a staunch family man and a pillar of the local society. He was on the City Council, a Church Treasurer and always up to some good.

In 1945, a few weeks after Gwyn died, Jack had put up for Labour and become an MP. Subsequently, he'd spent most of his time, away from his family, down south living with that Beth Farrell who had been a teacher at Ryelands School. She was supposed to be his personal assistant!

Rob had had to grow up fast in those years. His father having departed, he was the only male in the house, when he was in the house, right from being a very young teenager. "More like the male out of the house," his mother described him.

Rob was street-wise at fourteen. He did well at the Junior Technical School, at the Storey Institute. He'd started there when he was twelve and eventually had good trade qualifications. Not that he'd ever put them to good use! "There are easier ways to make a living than working!" he'd boast.

"Did he die happy? I mean, your old man," Rob asked his friend.

"Yes, I think he did. He never complained. Always called himself a lucky man. But you remember what he was like. He always said, "Deeds should speak louder than words!"
"Not like mine, he never stopped yapping."

They paid the taxi man and went into the lounge. It was quite crowded and smokey in there. There was nobody they recognised.

"Tell you where we could go, just for a laugh?"
"Go on! Try me!"
"Let's go to your Aunty Joyce's, in Queen Street. If she's still there, we might have a good night."

Michael was a bit doubtful. His mother and Joyce had been good friends when he was a boy. But something went wrong between them, even though she married his Dad's brother, Frank, when he came home from the war. Joyce never visited Gordon and Margaret after Gwyn died. The Watsons never called at Joyce's when they occasionally shopped in Queen Street.

Michael would have liked to have seen more of his Uncle Frank but his mother would have none of it, for a reason she did not disclose. The two brothers occasionally saw each other in the canteen at work, until Frank left Joyce, and took a ten pounds, one-way passage to Australia. After that, it was just the exchanging of Christmas cards and a short note once a year.

Michael knew the adults in his childhood and youth had hidden plenty from him. He had certainly kept secret from them all sorts of things. Now they gave it a fancy name, 'The generation gap', as though it was something new!

He'd finished his beer and decided he didn't want another one in there. He went along with Rob's suggestion. "We could give it a try. I don't suppose I've seen her for over thirty years. She's probably dead by now."

But she wasn't! There she was, a lively peroxide blonde, bright blouse and skirt, heavy make-up, same perfume as ever. Not bad for seventy! She'd worn well, Michael thought, recognising her immediately, serving behind the bar. She came to serve them, and her perfume brought back a memory of when he was a child.

He used to like the smell of her when she picked him up and gave him a hug.

"Two pints of bitter please," Michael asked.
"Coming up love!" She smiled, her professional smile.

He smiled back at her. "What's up with you?" she asked. "You're giving me an old-fashioned look. Either that or I've got something on the end of my nose!"
"You don't know me do you? I'm Michael. Michael Watson."
She took a long look at him. "Well I never!" she exclaimed, totally surprised.

While she was catching her breath, Michael said, "Well I never, either! But I wish I'd had the chance!"
"Ee! Love! I should have known you straight away. Your eyes! You've got your father's eyes."

She stared at Michael's hands, grasping his glass of beer. "And his hands! You've got the same big hands as him. He always had lovely hands did your Dad. My God, it takes me back a bit! How are your Dad and Mam?"
"I'm afraid my Dad died recently but Margaret's fine."
"That's a shame! I used to be fond of your Dad. He was a real sport!" She didn't say anything about Margaret.

Rob had been silent while all this was going on. "You'll not know me love," he said to her, "but Michael and me, we've been friends all our lives. I'm Rob. I think you met my mother once or twice way back. Mike's Mam used to say I led him astray."

"Didn't need much leading! Not in those days did I?" Michael smirked.

The pub was in need of decorating and the bar furnishings could do with replacing. Like Morecambe, the place had seen better years. "How's business these days? You have a good crowd in tonight."

"Not like it used to be! I have my ways of making ends meet so I don't do too badly. Anyway, what are you doing here? Have you come back to live locally?"
"No! Just visiting old haunts. You're the first person I've met from way back."
"It's lovely to see you. I'll have to leave you for a minute! Excuse me! I'm keeping my regulars waiting." Joyce carried on serving. Mike felt it had been a good idea of Rob's. There was a good atmosphere in the pub.

They spent the evening there. It was Talent Night and the beer was good. "We're a free house," Joyce laughed. "Free entry, free entertainment, free-and-easy we are. But you'll have to pay for your beer! And those two don't come cheap!" she whispered as two likely-lasses came to the far end of the bar and gave Michael and Rob the eye.

"How about it?" Rob asked Michael. "We'd be all right there!"
"You might be. I'm a settled married man. Knowing you, you could manage the pair of them."

It was an exceptionally good crowd in the pub, for a Thursday night. The customers were mainly Joyce's regulars and were a noisy, friendly lot. The Talent Night entertainment wasn't too bad. It included two disco dancers, a singing duo and a blue comedian. The two disco dancers won. The bloke looked a bit like John Travolta but his head was twice as big. You could see from his body-language that he really fancied himself.

The two likely lasses made their mark with Rob. The more he drank, the more attractive the blonde of the pair appeared to be to Michael. When the pub closed, the quartet joined Joyce for an after-hours drinking session.

"We'll have to order a taxi," Michael urged Rob, around midnight.
"Or book in here for the night!" Rob replied, giving Michael a nudge and a wink.
"Plenty of rooms to spare, haven't we girls?" Joyce urged.

The girls agreed enthusiastically.

The next morning, when she was having her breakfast with Joyce the blonde asked her,

"Why were you so keen to fix me up with that chap last night? Why did you tell me he was the one I had to have?"
Joyce took a sip of her tea, inhaled, blew a cloud of smoke up into the air and answered, "Reasons!"
"Another of your games I suppose?"

Joyce responded with, "Well, let's face it, we're all on the game, one way or another, aren't we?"
"Very funny! The point is, I hope he paid you before he went. He didn't give me a penny and he'd gone when I woke up. Not exactly the generous sort! Jan got fifteen pounds off her bloke."
"Don't worry, I'll see you're all right. Oh yes, he paid me all right! Some old dues!"
"What do you mean by that?"
"Nothing you'd know about love! Just something I arranged for my own satisfaction. Something to amuse me.

“You know me,” she continued. “Memory like an elephant. I lost somebody I was fond of to a friend of mine, a long time ago, and your bloke being with you was a sort of final settlement. Gave me satisfaction. I just wish I was twenty years younger, I'd have taken him on myself. That would have been perfect."

Her young friend stubbed her cigarette out on her saucer, shrugged and said, "I'm off to get dressed. You keep your mystery to yourself!"

When he collected his luggage from the Castle Hotel, Michael apologised for not having stayed his last night there.

The landlady smiled. "All the same to me love. You paid when you arrived. That's all I'm worried about. Have a good journey home!"

It took Michael five hours to drive back. "That bloody Rob!" he thought. "He always was a bad influence on me."
  
As he drove, he wondered why Joyce had been falling about laughing the previous night, when he and the blonde girl went upstairs, about one o'clock in the morning. Why had she found it so hilarious? Were they such an incongruous looking couple. You'd have thought his shirt tail was hanging out through a hole in his trousers.

"Coincidence is a funny thing!" she'd said, when she handed him the key to the room for himself and the girl. He pondered the meaning of her laughter. He was nearly home when he thought back to the incident in his childhood right in the middle of the war. It was so long ago! But his sub-conscious must have been working on it. Himself, his mam and that man, all waking up in the same bed!

That bitch Joyce! She'd remembered! She'd put him in the same room last night on purpose! Room 7! He remembered now. Yes, Room 7!

Well, all he could think was, it had been a good adventure!

He'd always enjoyed a good adventure…

Chapter 74: Tragedy

Gwyn had grown tall and straight. She was full of energy and as healthy as any of her lively friends. Like Michael, she was a bright child and enjoyed every minute of her life, working or playing at school and at home. She had a more placid nature than her brother and hardly ever cried about anything. She never put on her parts and Mike had never seen her in a tantrum. She was not moody like Michael.

During Gordon's Christmas leave, Michael went visiting relatives with his Dad. They went back to Edward Street. Nothing had changed – but it all seemed different to Michael. The houses seemed to be smaller and the street narrower. Aunt Elsie was just the same in her dark clothing and in her ocking chair.

They stayed long enough to see Joan. She was a super-looking teenager and going to leave school soon. Michael felt shy with her but watched her every movement appreciatively. The didn't say much to each other. Michael stayed close to his Dad where he felt safe.

One afternoon, Michael and his Dad set the model train-lines out together and played with the train set. Michael explained to Gordon what train-spotting and collecting engine names and numbers was all about. He told him how John and he had visited the engine sheds behind Cable Street, and how a friendly engine-driver had let them ride on the footplate up to Castle Station and back again. John was always hanging around the engines and had got to know some of the drivers.

Michael told Gordon about them paying a penny for a platform ticket out of the ticket machine. How they liked sitting on a bench at Castle Station collecting the numbers of the express trains and the ones which stopped at Lancaster. Michael asked his father, "What does RTO stand for Dad? There's a room on the station with a notice like that on it."

"It stands for Railway Transport Officer. It's a place where Forces people can go for help, if they have problems with late trains or if they lose their tickets and stuff like that." Gordon told Michael about busy Crewe railway station where he changed trains coming on leave.

"There's a big junction there and a railway works. You'd be able to collect dozens of names and numbers," he told him.

Michael had had a wristwatch for Christmas and F. Maurice Speed's Film Review 1944. He was film mad and it had been an expensive purchase, agreed on only because of his obvious obsession with films.

"Well," said his Mam, "I can see it's more than a fad with you so I'll see what I can do." He read parts of it to Gordon and showed him photos of some of the films which he had been to with Wilf.

Gordon enjoyed looking at the glamour photos and noticed Michael did too. "I've missed a lot because of the war," he mused. "The children are growing up so fast, I hardly know them!"

Michael spent many hours with Gordon during his Christmas leave but whenever he could he escaped outdoors to be with his friends. He went next door nearly every evening for an hour to see John. John had had a fantastic, expensive game of table-football for Christmas and the two boys played with it at every opportunity.

Gwyn spent every minute possible with her Dad. Every spare moment that he had she was with him, making up for lost time. She loved to sit on his knee and cuddle up to him with her special cat, Jesse, purring away and hugged close to her.

"Do cats live a long time, Dad?"
"Quite a long time love. Why?"
"Doreen says my cats will all die before I'm grown up. Is it true?"
"Well love, you never can tell. You may be lucky. They could live to be twenty or more but not often."
"I don't want them to die before me Dad. I want them to be with me always." Her cat rolled over and she tickled its stomach.

The cat purred and she went on stroking it.

"Will you be coming home soon Dad?" she asked. "Why can't you stay? I don't like it when you're not here. I want to be with you forever and ever."
"I hope it won't be long now love. I only wish I was back with you. They say the war will be over soon."
"I've just remembered Dad, you haven't measured us yet."

Every leave, Gordon stood his two children up against the dining-room wall, near the kitchen door.

"Stand up straight!" he'd say. Then he'd take a ruler, place it flat on their heads and write their initials where the ruler touched the wall. He wrote very lightly with the pencil so that it did not show much and spoil the wallpaper. The evidence of their steady growth, from infants to where they were now, could be seen there.

"You're right!" Gordon said to Gwyn. "Remind me, when Michael comes in. We'll do it right away!"

Gwyn liked to do things for and with her Dad. She loved having his attention and being close to him. Gordon enjoyed her being like that. He thought, what a fool he'd been, in 1939. Why had he joined up? He should have stayed with her and the rest of the family. Gwyn needed him. All three needed him to be with them at home. Had he got his priorities right? But what if everyone had stayed at home? Hitler had to be stopped. Where would they be now if men like him hadn't made the decision to go and fight?

Gwyn was always asking him things like, "Shall I put the sugar in your tea Dad?"
"Do you want me to fetch your slippers Dad?"
"Can I undo your tie Dad?"
"Can I help you polish your cap badge Dad?"
"Can I go with you to see Nan Dad?"
"Shall we go and see Uncle Brian Dad?"

She was always round him. He loved it. "My Little Maid," he called her and "Twinkle Toes." He was always making fancy names up for her. "Princess Gwyn"! "My Precious Treasure"!

He lifted her and held her high above his head. She nearly banged her head on the ceiling. "I think I'll put you in my pocket and take you back to camp with me. How about that?"
"Will you really Dad? Would you like to? I'll come with you Dad! I could go with you everywhere all the time then."

Michael smiled when he heard them going on like that and carried on with his homework. It wasn't like when Gwyn had been with Wilf and he'd felt jealous. Michael loved to hear his Dad and Gwyn talk together and do things. He knew that his Dad would always find room for him when he was needed. He never felt excluded.

Margaret felt a bit shut out at times. She was the one who had to be forever disciplining Michael and seeing to all the day-to-day business of looking after them both. Michael thought his Dad was the Lord of Creation and Gwyn was always clinging round her father. Gordon was having all the cream.

However, there was one big compensation when he came home. Their sticky patch was over and she and her husband were at ease with each other again. It wasn't exactly a second honeymoon. Peace had been declared. It was not unconditional surrender but it was more than an armistice.

Gordon's leave ended, school started, Michael had his twefth birthday and winter receded. Spring was on the way. Michael was feeling better about school. He was settling in during his second term and becoming used to what had seemed, at first, to be stupid rules and boring lessons.

When he did well in the Lower School set run which started outside the side school gate, with everybody, hundreds of them, made to participate, he had a real sense of achievement. They had to struggle all the way up the steep hill, trot past the park and then run down the hill past the Moor Hospital. They then started cutting back round the outside of the park.

There was a painful, uphill struggle again, legs leaden, fighting for breath. At last, with the help of gravity, they raced to a fast finish, all the way down Wyresdale Road and into school. It was about two miles. After he'd run off a painful stitch in his side near the hospital, Michael enjoyed it. He'd come in the first twenty and helped his house do well. Perhaps 'Sudge's' urgings and promotings of team-spirit were working.

When he arrived home, he opened the door and shouted, "Mam! Gwyn! I'm home. I did it all right and I came eighteenth."

There was no reply, and when he was hanging his coat up in the hall, his mother appeared at the top of the stairs. She had a worried expression on her face and put her fingers to her lips.

"Shh!" she said in a whisper, "Gwyn's not well again. I've just got her off to sleep."
That evening, Margaret wrote a long letter to Gordon.

My Dearest Gordon,

I know it's not easy but is there any chance of you taking some leave in the next few days? I don't want to worry you but Gwyn has not been at all well recently. It all started with that sty in her eye, which I told you about a fortnight ago. I had some Golden Eye Ointment from Cuthbert's the Chemist but when I went again last week he said if it did not clear up she should really see the doctor. She didn't look well and was always weary. When she started with a bad headache, I decided to take her to see the doctor. He gave her a good examination and looked a bit worried. He said she needed a lot of rest and to take her home to bed.

He called to see her this afternoon and gave her some tablets for her headache and to help her to sleep. You know how she's always so cheerful and chirpy, she's not been like that really since you were last at home and she looks a lot thinner and really peaky. I can't make her eat a thing. She hasn't got a cough or a wheezy sound on her chest like she used to have as a baby but I am worried Gordon.

I wish you were here. I know I can always have a chat with May Howson, Sheila and Mrs Martin and depend on them for help but I feel lonely without you and don't know what to do for the best. The doctor's coming again in two days time. He says she might have to go into hospital. How can we afford that?

We had such a lovely Christmas. Everything seemed to be coming right again. And now this! I can't believe it. For years, I thought that we were out of the woods with Gwyn but she looks so poorly Gordon, I'm at my wits end.

I'm keeping my worry as best I can from Michael. He seems happy enough. He's settled a lot better at school and always has plenty to tell me about his cross-country running and about some new friends he's made in his class.

I know you don't like using the phone but if your officer will let you, do you think you could telephone the Martins so that I can speak to you. She's told me any time. They're always willing to help.

You know I wouldn't be worrying you with this but I have such a funny feeling about how she is.

 All my love,
 Margaret xxxx
Michael might not have been showing it but he was worried sick about his sister. He kept it to himself. He didn't say anything to his friends about it until after the doctor came and Margaret agreed that Gwyn should go into hospital. That was really serious! The Uglies were back!

Michael had retained some of his old sleeplessness and occasional nightmares as he grew older but nothing was as bad as it used to be. Now, it was his waking life that became a day-long nightmare. It was like being on a different planet. He was awake but living a different existence. Somebody else's mind, filled with dread and hopelessness, seemed to be occupying his body.

It got worse.

Gwyn was in hospital for two weeks. Visiting was only allowed on Wednesday and Saturday afternoons. Every non-visiting day, after school, Michael went willingly for his Mam, on his bike, to the Lancaster Royal Infirmary. He propped his bicycle, against the wall of the hospital. In the reception area, behind a desk, was a hospital porter. The first time he went there, the man asked him what he wanted.

"Hello my lad, what brings you here?"
"Please, Mister, I've come to ask how my sister is."
"And what may her name be?"
"Gwyn Watson."
"Just a moment young fellah." The porter stood up from his chair and consulted a book, on a side desk. He came back to Michael.
"It says she's satisfactory today."
"Thank-you, Mister."

Michael rode his bike back home and told his mother what the man had said. As he rode he pondered 'satisfactory'? Huh! What did that mean? Non-committal, just like his school report that had that word written on it!

The second day, when he went there, the kindly porter remembered him. "Hello lad! You'll have come about your sister. Gwyn Watson isn't she?"
"Yes, Mister," said Michael.

The man looked in the book and returned to Michael. He looked over the top of his spectacles at Michael and then spoke in a gentle voice, "I'm sorry lad but it says here she's on the danger list."

Michael's heart sank into his boots. He fumed to himself as he cycled, "But she was satisfactory yesterday! What's going on? Why aren't they doing something to make her better?" He pedalled home furiously to give his mother the bad news.

And so it went on: one day she would be satisfactory and another day she would be on the danger list. After a fortnight, there was no firm diagnosis, and there was no improvement.

An ambulance brought her back home. She was thinner and always had a headache. Gordon came on leave but had to go away again after a few precious days.

Margaret sat up all night with Gwyn who was always in a lot of pain. She had terrible headaches. May and Sheila persuaded Margaret to let them take a turn at the vigil over the sick child's bed. "If you go on like this, you'll be no good to her, or yourself. You have to have a rest."

Mr Martin offered a loan and a specialist was called in. His diagnosis was tuberculosis. He was hopeful that, if Gwyn went to a sanatorium, she might be well again within two or three years. If that were to happen, they would have to sell the house and go into cheap accommodation. Michael would have to leave the Grammar School and every means possible would have to be devised to find the money for her treatment.

Gordon's Commanding Officer gave him indefinite, compassionate leave. The crew completed the last mission safely without him. He came home to help nurse his child and make crucial decisions. Yes, Gwyn had to be given every chance, every possible treatment. It didn't need thinking about twice. Again, Mr Martin offered a loan and was accepted when he said they could borrow more money from him. Pride did not come into it, if it was a matter of life or death.

It got worse.

Gwyn was a marvellous patient, lying in bed day-after-day. Her trusting, loving eyes were almost unnaturally bright and contrasted with her pale, translucent skin.

"It's hurting again, Mam," she'd say, with pathetic resignation, "The pain's come back again." Margaret would give her more of the 'special' medicine, which the doctor left in a bottle for her.

Then one afternoon, it seemed that a miracle had happened.

Gwyn rallied. It was a warm April day and the bedroom window was open. She could hear her friend, Doreen, and some other girls playing in the garden.

"Mam," she asked, "Can I get up for a bit? I want to play out with Doreen."

Margaret could not believe it. Did it mean the illness had relented? She hesitated, then asked Sheila to help her take Gwyn downstairs into the garden. She was wrapped in a blanket and sat on a chair. The girls came round to see her. When Michael arrived home from school, the girls were playing at being teacher and pupils. Gwyn sat by the blackboard and pretended to be the teacher. He rushed indoors to his mother.

"Is she better, Mam?"
"I hope so son."

The back door was open and while Michael sat in the kitchen eating a biscuit, watching his Mam prepare a meal, he could hear the chattering girls, outside in the spring sunshine.

Then Doreen came in and said, "You'd better come Mrs Watson. Gwyn wants you."

It had been a brief respite. Gwyn had had one last opportunity to be with her best friends.

Michael was not sleeping. The Uglies were in charge again! He was awake that night, after midnight, when Sheila Matthews came into his bedroom, wrapped a blanket around him and told him to go downstairs with her.

Gwyn was worse.

Gordon had gone for the doctor. Then the screaming started. The sort of scream you can hear in Munch's painting, the screaming you can hear in the music of Gustav Mahler, the screaming Jack had heard when civilians had been bombed in Barcelona, the screaming of the dog that had been knocked down in Lancaster when Michael was a little boy, the scream that Michael had let out when his hand was burned by the poker. But that pain had not lasted long. Gwyn's did!

When the doctor arrived, he went straight upstairs. After a little while the screaming stopped but it stayed in Michael's head for ever and never ever went away.

The doctor came down. Michael sat there, wrapped in the blanket, shivering, although a night fire had been lit and was burning brightly. Michael had been chewing on a corner of his blanket and it was all wet.

The doctor stayed talking to Michael for a while. Then he went upstairs again. When he came down he said, "You can go up to bed now. Your sister's asleep. She's peaceful now."

The doctor whispered something to Sheila Matthews and then he departed.
Sheila took Michael up to bed. "You'll have to be a very brave boy Michael. Your Mam and Dad need you to be brave. Good night, Michael. I'll leave the light on for you."

"Yes Mrs Matthews. Thank you Mrs Matthews."
Then his Dad came in. "You all right son?"
"Yes Dad."
"Well goodnight then. Try to sleep!"
"Yes Dad. I'll try." But he couldn't. He was listening for Gwyn. But the doctor had managed to help her. She didn't scream again. Not that night!

Word had gone out. The Watsons had a very sick child! Relatives, friends, neighbours, the curate, the lady who took the Brownies, the milk-lady, all sorts of people visited, every day.

They brought gifts of sweets, chocolate; girlish feminine items; little fluffy toys; get-well cards; even a quarter of a pound of green grapes which were worth a fortune. People brought themselves and their grave concern. It was overwhelming and frightening. Michael knew that it all meant one thing: his little sister was going to die.

Beth Farrell, Gwyn's teacher came. She brought a bar of chocolate with her. Gordon answered the door. He saw her standing there, looking very concerned. He was too far gone in sorrow to be worried about or aware of his deep feelings for her anymore. The reality of the love he was losing had banished his romantic feelings. She was just another visitor. He went upstairs to be with Gwyn and sent Margaret down.

Beth greeted Margaret and said, "I'm so sorry Mrs Watson."
"Yes."
"She's a lovely child. I really enjoy teaching her." She was still using the present tense.
"Thank you."
"I hope you don't mind me calling."
"Not at all. It's very kind of you."
"Do you think that she would like to see me?"
"I'm sorry Miss Farrell, but she's too far gone for that. She's sleeping most of the time and doesn't recognise anyone when she does come round a bit."

A junior school teacher has pupils in her class, sitting with her for many hours a day, for at least a year. It's usually a close, loving relationship. In loco parentis!

Any committed teacher feels a pang when she has to pass HER class on to another teacher, at the end of each summer. But one of her pupils dying? Surely, that didn't happen any more! Only in war! And in the bad old days! Beth bit her lip. She felt like crying. But she wasn't there for that. She was there to be supportive.

"Oh, I see. Well, I'd best be going. I did not mean to trouble you."
"It was very kind of you to call Miss Farrell. I'll try and let Gwyn know you've been. She may be able to understand more than we think."

Beth went.

Aunt Elsie came from Edward Street. She and Margaret clung to each other and wept buckets. Joan came with her. "Hello Michael," she said. Michael was almost too shy to speak, likw when his dad had taken him visiting at Christmas. Joan was such a beautiful young teenager. He could say nothing. He still felt what he'd always felt for her. She gave Michael a bag of sweets.

"They're for Gwyn but you can have one. Go on, take one. They won't bite you!"
Michael raised his eyes and looked straight at her. He felt that he could have drowned in her lovely eyes. He took the sweets. "Thank you Joan."

Joyce visited. She came by taxi with her little girl. She was dressed in black. It suited her. She and Margaret spoke together for a short while. The real purpose of Joyce's visit had been to tell Margaret that she'd heard her husband was dead and so was Margaret's friend from Room Seven. When she saw for herself the desperation of the Watsons, she kept her own bad news to herself. It could wait.

Joyce could not believe how ill Margaret looked. Her own appearance had hardly been affected by her husband's death. Yet another bar of chocolate was left behind when she departed.

Gwyn had eaten practically nothing for many days. Michael had come up with the idea that she might like some ice-cream. His Mam agreed.

"She might love. But where on earth would we find ice-cream these days?"
"I know a place Mam. A boy at school told me about it."

It was lunchtime. Michael always came home for his lunch, as the school break was two hours, from noon until two in the afternoon. He had plenty of time.
"I could go on my bike Mam. It wouldn't take me long. I'll be there and back in no time. She might like an ice-cream Mam. Our Gwyn's always loved an ice-cream Mam."

Margaret took sixpence out of her purse and gave it to him. "Where are you going for it?"
"It's in Bare Lane, a house just three away from the station. They make it themselves. Rix at school says it's good stuff. He lives near there."

His mother gave Michael a glass jar with a screw-top, to put the ice-cream in. He had a saddle bag on his bike. He'd had that for his birthday. He fetched his bike from the shed and wheeled it out onto the road. As he cycled, a funny idea came into his head. "I'll make a bargain with you, God. If I can get the ice-cream back in five minutes and less time than that every day for a week, you'll have to let her live. Right?"

It was like the games his Dad had always played, setting himself targets. But, Michael knew that this was no game. It was a matter of life or death. It was up to him to save his sister. God would listen. God would reward him if he succeeded.

It was a lovely, late April day. The sky was azure blue, with a few cotton-wool clouds floating way-up on high. Michael was sweating by the time he'd cycled to the top of Cross Hill.

When he reached the end of Bare Lane, where the ice-cream house was, the signal-man had just left his high box next to the station and was swinging the level-crossing gates closed because there was a train coming from Euston Road Station. No time for train numbers today!

He went up a front garden path. There were daffodils and tulips on either side and shrubs with green tips and hints of colour, all about to burst into life, as the warm sun urged them to their annual resurrection.

It was the right house. Rix had been telling the truth. There was a tub of ice-cream in the porch. Michael rang the bell. A motherly, grey-haired, elderly lady came.

"Hello love! What would you like?"
"May I have sixpenneth of ice-cream in this jar please?"
"You certainly may!" The lady took a scoop and plopped two generous helpings into the jar. She took his money and handed the container back to him.
"Mind you don't drop it!" she said.

Michael went back to his bike, which he'd leaned up against her garden wall, placed the ice-cream in his saddle bag, looked at his watch, mounted his bike and cycled furiously all the way home. When he arrived there, his watch told him that he'd done it! In just under five minutes. "Right God," he said to himself, "now it's up to you!"

He still had some time to spare before he went for his bus back to school. He took a teaspoon out of the kitchen drawer and went upstairs. "I've got it mam," he said. "Can I give it to her?"

His mother smiled. "You weren't long! Just a minute, I'll prop her up. Perhaps you can coax a bit down her."

Michael went and knelt by the bed.
"Come on Gwyn. Look what I've brought you. It's your favourite. It's lovely ice-cream."

The faintest of smiles flitted across Gwyn's face. She didn't say anything but she hadn't dissented. Michael dipped the spoon in the jar.
"Just a little Michael. Not too much!" his mother entreated.

Michael put a morsel of the ice-cream onto the end of the spoon and placed it between Gwyn's lips. Her mouth opened slightly and he managed to push some, gently, inside. She did not swallow any. It dribbled out again.

Michael's heart sank.
His mother took the container and spoon from him.
"You'd best be off. You don't want to be late for school.
I'll give her some, after you've gone."
"Right Mam." Michael stood up. He bent over Gwyn and said, "I'll see you later Gwyn. I have to go now."

She smiled faintly again, when he waved to her from the bedroom door. It was the last time she knew who he was. Jesse her cat was on the bed but it wasn't purring.

It got worse.

He hadn't been sleeping for weeks and he could not concentrate. He'd been neglecting his lessons, and that afternoon, there was going to be a test. When the lesson started, the teacher said he was going to ask questions round the class, instead of asking them to write the answers down.

He'd asked six questions and most of the boys had put their hands up each time. The chosen ones had all answered correctly. Michael's hand had stayed down because he hadn't known any of the answers. The seventh question came. Again, Michael did not know the answer. The teacher was on to him!

"Watson, stand up!"
Michael stood up.
"Is there something wrong with your arm Watson? Have you lost the use of it?"
"No sir!"
"Then why Watson are you not putting it up to answer the questions like all the others?"
"I don't know sir."
"Don't know? Do you mean you don't know the answers to any of my questions?"
"Don't know sir!"

A ripple of laughter went round the class and the teacher decided to play to his audience. "Well, Mr 'Don't Know,' let's try you. Let's see if you know anything. What day is it Watson?"
"Thursday sir!"

"Ah so, Mr 'Don't Know ' does know which day of the week it is."

The boys laughed appreciatively at the teacher's heavy sarcasm. Michael felt his lip trembling. He must not cry. Big boys didn't cry. Especially at that school. He would be an object of derision if he did. If he said to himself, "It's not fair!" he knew self-pity would well up inside him and he'd start blubbing. Instead, he tried concentrating on hating his tormentor. For a while, it worked.

Then the teacher asked him an easy question. He didn't know the answer. "Tell him!" bade the teacher. Most of the kids called out the answer.


"Perhaps he can't hear, tell him louder." All of the class shouted the answer again. It felt like they were shouting at him. They were all against him. All the world was against him. Everybody was against him. Nobody understood. He hated them all.

The teacher told the boys to shout the answer again. They all did, except for Trevor Rix. The rest were really enjoying what was going on. It was finally too much for Michael and he started to blub.

"Stand on your chair, Watson!" ordered the teacher.

Michael climbed onto his chair. He stood there, a pathetic figure, a dejected object. He'd taken his handkerchief out and kept on wiping his eyes and blowing his nose, while the teacher went on and on with his sarcasm. "What a spectacle!" he sneered. "What a pathetic object you are Watson!" Michael could not hear him any more. He stood there enduring the derisive remarks, the mockery, the betrayal by the other pupils.

"The poor little thing hasn't done his homework and now he feels sorry for himself. Oh look, how sorry he feels for himself." Michael's shoulders were heaving uncontrollably now as the fir ot sobbing took him over. The teacher had no mercy. He carried on, "Perhaps one of you will go and fetch a bucket to catch his tears. Maybe he'll fill it for us."

Michael began to think that was quite possible. The more the man spoke, the more Michael cried. Soon he was convulsed with crying, uncontrollable grief pouring out of him.

At last, the teacher restrained himself. "Sit down!" he said to Michael. "Let it be a lesson to you. Do your homework in future!"

Michael sat down and the lesson continued.

Many years later, there was an obituary in the Lancaster Guardian. The teacher, the one who had tormented Michael, had just died. The newspaper's list of his good deeds seemed endless. He left behind a loving wife and five children. He was Jewish, a refugee, from Nazi oppression in Germany. He had fled to England in 1937. He had lost most of his family and many friends in the Holocaust.

Michael wondered, "Was that the reason he gave me such a bad time that afternoon, just a week before the war ended. Had he just discovered the awful truth about what had happened to his people? Did the sight of me, crying over a failure to do my homework, bring out the latent sadist in him, at a time when he was consumed with grief because of the horrors in his life?

"Maybe he was as ignorant of my sorrowing for my sister as I was of his for his dead beloved relatives," he considered. "Both in our sealed compartments, hating each other, when we should have been consoling each other and embracing like brothers! My torture had been inflicted by an apparently uncaring God and his by the evil of Mankind. It came to the same thing."

Friday lunch-time, Michael went for more ice-cream. He looked at his watch and raced for home.

It got worse.

Mindful of the bargain he had made with God, he was making every effort to be home well inside five minutes, when his progress was halted. He had just passed the entrance to Powder House Lane and he got a puncture! He dismounted and ran the rest of the way pushing the bike, trying desperately to keep his side of the bargain.

He failed, by two minutes. That was it then. He'd lost. It was hopeless.

He took the ice-cream upstairs. Mam took it from him, at the bedroom door. "You can go in, but she won't know you."

Michael went into the bedroom. Gwyn looked terrible. The skin was taut and stretched, transparent, across the bones of her face. Her eyes were open but unseeing.

"Hello Gwyn," he whispered. There was no response. No flicker of recognition in her eyes. Her breathing was loud, more like snoring. Michael fled from the room.

He buried his face in his Mam's dress for a minute. Then he ran downstairs, picked up his books for afternoon school and raced off down the road, along Morecambe Road, over Carlisle Bridge, across town, and still running, went all the way up East Road and into the cloakroom at school. He sat half-hidden by the coats hanging there.

He stayed for a while until the bell went. "You all right?" whispered Trevor Rix as they stood outside their classroom.

"Yes," said Michael. "I'll survive!"
"You what?" asked Trevor.
"Nothing! You wouldn't understand if I told you! And be quiet; the prefect's watching!

When Michael came home from morning school on Saturday, he went in through the back door. Sheila Matthews was in the kitchen, waiting for him. "Don't take your coat off," she said, "I've left you some lunch at our house. Rob is waiting for you. You can play with him and the girls. I'll be there in a little while." Michael wondered why she was speaking in a whisper.

After he'd been at Rob's about an hour, Mrs Matthews came. Michael could see that she'd been crying. "You'd better go home now Michael. Your mother will be expecting you." She patted the top of his head as he went and said, "We'll see you again soon."

Michael walked home slowly and turned the corner into Sefton Drive. It was drizzling and everything looked drab. The daffodils in the gardens had their heads bowed and rainwater was dripping off the trees. There were no birds singing, just a few black crows, circling over the woods and cawing. It was a miserable afternoon.

All of the curtains in the house were drawn.

It was over.

It could not get any worse!

The hymn at assembly that morning had been:

"God's in his heaven
All's right with the world"

Gordon had to go back to the RAF after the funeral. It was Victory in Europe Day. All over Lancaster, there was rejoicing. Flags were everywhere in windows and strung across the streets. Bonfires were lit and blackout material burned. He went, all on his own, for a late-evening train. At the top of Vicarage Lane, he paused and looked around.

There were lights on all over Lancaster. For the first night in over five years the blackout was over and the lights were on again. There was a terrible blackness inside Gordon. The irony of it all! His world was at an end and everyone else was contemplating future happiness. They were alive. They'd survived. The war was over. All he could think of was his dead daughter Gwyn!

He had a compartment to himself. People didn't want to be on a train when they could be celebrating at home or elsewhere. He lay full-length on the seats and tried to make sense of it all. He could make none. But he realised there was still Michael to think of. Michael would have to be to looked after and helped through this ordeal. He made a vow there and then to redouble his efforts to care and provide for his son, in every way possible.

Poor Gordon! The world was happy in 1918, when a war ended but he mourned his father. It was the same in 1945 and this time it was his daughter.

Margaret made a bed up on the floor in Michael's bedroom and slept there. She could not face being on her own at night. She felt as though a knife had been inserted into her stomach and all her innards removed.

Michael's insomnia continued. He would lie awake in the middle of the night. He became familiar with all the sounds of after-midnight. There was the wind and its various noises: its sighs, its roarings and whisperings. The tapping of twigs on the window.

Clankings were heard clearly from over the river where the shunting of railway goods wagons went on at Williamson's. A night bird screeched. No traffic, the road was quiet. A hunted animal cried from the wood. An express train's whistle from afar then its rumbling over Carlisle Bridge. Wooden beams in the house creaked. His mother's alarm clock tick-tocked on the dressing-table. A door was slammed by a late-night reveller returning home. His mother's deep breathing stopped and was replaced by the sound of her quiet sobbing. It went on for a long time. He did not let her know that he was awake.

Inside his head, Gwyn screamed. The Uglies rejoiced and laughed!

Margaret had kept Michael away from the funeral, where she collapsed and had to be supported by Gordon and two of her brothers. There were hundreds of people there.

Fumigators came and sealed the room where Gwyn had died. The cause of death had been established as tubercular meningitis. There was a slight risk of infection. They removed the bedclothes and Gwyn's clothing and sprayed everywhere in the room. They took away thirty bars of chocolate and ten bags of sweets, nearly a year's ration.

Mrs Martin and Sheila Matthews removed every trace of Gwyn from the house. It was Margaret's wish. She wanted to forget. No photographs would be displayed. Later, the time would come when she tried desperately to remember the good times, when her daughter laughed and smiled.

The memories became elusive and the few photographs that had been retained, hidden, were scanned anxiously for proof that once there had been happiness in her life. Much, much later, there would be a desperate striving, within, to regain memories of the good times and an attempt to forget the horror.

The grave would not be visited. It was not the certainty of death which she sought.

Within three months, Margaret's hair turned white.

Michael felt that life was meaningless. All of Gwyn's clothes had gone, and her toys. Michael went upstairs when they were sorting things. Sheila handed Michael Gwyn's ration book. "Your mam says to burn this."

Michael took the book. Before throwing it on the fire, he extracted the sweet coupons. He didn't care if God was watching. God wouldn't be bothered about anything he did or didn't do! He was going to have those sweets. He folded the sheet of coupons up and put it in the inside pocket of his school blazer.

Before he said his prayers that night, a little voice told him he was doing wrong. "It won't make any difference to her will it? She's dead. You let her die! Don't you, of all people, try to tell me what's right and what's wrong!" he'd aways had a personal thing, an all-powerful man.

Next day, he took a message by bus to his Aunty Belle. His mother had said he could stay awhile and play with Peter. They went to the park and sat and watched people playing tennis. After a while, Michael asked Peter, "Have you any pocket-money?"

"I've got a bob.Why?"
"I've some spare sweet coupons. Swap you for some dough?"
"All right!"

Michael felt inside the pocket of his blazer and took out the pink sheet of coupons.
"Why, you've a load there!" exclaimed Peter. "Let's go to Smith's sweet shop and buy something."

They stood outside the shop, undecided what to buy. While they were looking in the window, the little voice came again. "They're not yours. They're Gwyn's. It's not right." This time, Michael listened and obeyed the voice. Right in front of Peter's wondering eyes, he held up the sheet of coupons. He paused. He tore it in half, and tore it again, and again, and again, until it was all in shreds. He then pushed the bits down a drain at the side of the road.

He knew he could explain to his cousin Peter why he'd done it. Peter had always understood when he had problems. He told him what the business with the sweet coupons was all about. Peter put his arm round Michael's shoulders. "Come along Michael! Don't be upset! You'll be all right." He walked Michael back to Aunty Belle's.

Weeks, months, years passed but the traumatised family never came to terms with what had happened. It would have been better if they had talked to each other. Outwardly, it seemed as though Gwyn had never existed. Internally, it was like a bleeding wound that never healed.

When Gordon died, in 1983, Michael opened his father's leather wallet. There was a little money in it, a 'lucky' threepenny bit and two photographs of Gwyn. He'd hardly ever spoken of her but every day of his life, for the next thirty-eight years, he must have looked at her photographs and mourned, thinking his secret thoughts. His grief had been beyond words and too deep for anything other than secret tears when he was alone.

Michael never said, "It's not fair!" about anything that happened to him ever again. He matured early and realised he lived in a world containing many unlucky people: a world with much poverty, many tragedies and numerous sorrows. After the death of his luckless sister, he knew he was fortunate, one of the extremely lucky ones. He had his health and he prospered. Nothing to do with his cleverness! He never felt that he had earned his luck. He just tried to make the best of it.

Ultimately, in some ways, Gwyn's death strengthened Michael. He hated it when people moaned about little things. He agreed with Nan when she said, "We should all count our blessings." It also made him fatalistic, a gambler and reckless.

He had had the good fortune to have been born at a particular time in history and in a country which after the war prospered and distributed some of its prosperity more evenly than it had ever done in the past. The newspapers branded them as years of austerity. That depended on who you were and where you were coming from. And how deceptive your rose-coloured spectacles were!

Gwyn had been desperately unlucky with her fatal disease. Just a few years later, there was a National Health Service and there were cures for tuberculosis.
Jack Matthews was proved to have been right. After 1945, many things did change for the better. But human nature didn't change. It wasn't only the rich of the past who were corrupted by materialism. The future was to prove that greed was not exclusive to any class or group.

One of Gordon's cliches summed it up, "Money is the root of all evil." High paid workers were as acquisitive, greedy and uncaring for the less-fortunate in the world as the bosses had always been. With notable exceptions of course!

Jack visited Lancaster, just before he died, in the early sixties. He rang Gordon up and arranged to see him at a meeting he'd been asked to address, on world poverty.

Gordon was still working at Williamson's and very much involved in local politics. Jack was well-known nationally as a rebel Labour MP.

 At the gathering of the comrades, Jack asserted, "We're all James Williamsons now in the eyes of the Third World. Are we as generous with our new wealth as he was with his? Are we even worse than he was in our neglect of the world's underprivileged? When we contemplate the plight of our fellow-human beings, in other parts of the globe, are we sufficiently moved to brush a few crumbs from our table of plenty, into their eager, needy hands?"

After the meeting, Jack and Gordon went for a drink together in Moor Lane. They still drank pints of bitter. Jack surveyed the interior of the pub with approval.

"Not changed much has it, since we first came in here?"
"Neither have you!" Gordon smiled. "Still spouting your head off! Cheers!"
Jack responded, "Cheers! Bottoms up!"

"Here's to the future!" said Gordon.

"Yes - but don't forget the past!" answered Jack.

Chapter 73: Incidents

Margaret saw Wilf as her ultimate challenge. She'd finally suspected what had always been true - that he'd been up to no good. The local policeman called a few times and asked to speak with him. When she questioned him about this, he was evasive and she became less confident about his being such a good influence on Michael. She forgot her misgivings, to a certain extent, when she finally persuaded Wilf to start going to evensong, on Sundays, with Michael and Gwyn.

"Your voice has broken so you'll be no good in the choir. You can sit with Gwyn." Wilf had never had any intention of joining the choir.

Gwyn was delighted. "Will you? Will you sit with me Wilf?"

"Course I will darlin," Wilf replied. He'd make sure he'd be sitting next to Eileen Perkins too, his latest conquest, and a regular attender at the church.

There was going to be a special carol service, just before Christmas. It gave him a chance to show off in front of Eileen so Wilf agreed to read one of the lessons. Margaret was convinced that Wilf was fully restored to virtuous ways.

Michael, Rob and Paul were to stand at the front and sing, "We Three Kings". At rehearsal, the curate praised them. "Well done lads! That sounds lovely."

On the day, they made a complete mess of it. They wore paper crowns and dressing gowns. Paul had an imitation moustache-and-beard. Unfortunately, his crown slipped one way, and his moustache the other. It happened half way through the verse he was supposed to be singing. This made Rob start laughing and he gave Michael a nudge. Michael saw the funny side of Paul's misfortune and he started to giggle. Paul tried to control himself but soon all three were convulsed with laughter. The organist glared at them, which made them laugh even more. The congregation smiled indulgently, but the curate, seeing that it was a situation which could not be salvaged, stepped forward and escorted them to the choir vestry.

Their mothers were not pleased.

"Made a public disgrace of us!" Margaret stormed.

The three boys thought it was brilliant. The best thing that had happened to them since they'd started at different schools, at the end of summer! It sent the holidays off to a really good beginning. Nothing had really changed: they were still the best of mates! They knew how to misbehave together and enjoy themselves.

A few days later, Wilf's mother sent his railway fare through the post, and asked for him to be sent back home to London. Everyone was sorry to see him go.

Eileen wept buckets. Margaret shed a few tears. Gwyn cried. Wilf gave Michael his knife. Wilf said, "You'll have to come and stay with us in London when the war is over."

They all went to see him off at Lancaster Castle Station. They took Eileen with them. Wilf and Eileen kept on kissing passionately, before the train arrived. Margaret told them to stop it. "You're showing us all up, Wilf. Making a spectacle of yourself!"

"Sorry, Mrs Watson!" he said.

Then as the train arrived, he gave Margaret a hug and a big smacker for herself before he climbed aboard his carriage. Eileen stood on tiptoe and Wilf leaned down and kissed her yet again. The train departed and they all waved. And that was the end of Walworth's 'grand lad' in Lancaster.

Back at home, Margaret told Michael and Gwyn they could put the Christmas decorations up while she went out to do some shopping. They kept tattered trimmings from one year to the next. There was an old, artificial Christmas tree which Sheila Matthews had given them. Standing on a chair, Michael was able to reach the places to pin the trimmings up high. Gwyn found some fragile coloured balls and other ornaments for the tree. These were kept in a cardboard box, with a few small wax candles, under the stairs in the pantry.

When Margaret returned, she said, "That's more like it. You've done a good job. It seems more like Christmas now."

She went into the kitchen and left them to finish off. Michael found a box of matches on the mantlepiece. Gwyn saw him open the box. "You're not supposed to strike matches unless Mam's here," she warned.

"I know that. She's not far away. She's only in the kitchen isn't she! I know what I'm doing!" He struck a match and tried to light one of the wax candles which Gwyn had fixed to the tree. It wouldn't light at first, then it flickered into flame.

Michael lit another one. Soon all six candles were shining brightly. The tree was transformed. It had become a magical tree.

"Turn the light off Gwyn!"

She did so and the tree looked even lovelier, in the darkened room. Gwyn was ecstatic. She clapped her hands together and said, "You were right Michael. I'll ask Mam to come and look!"

"Mam! Mam! Come and look at the tree!" she called. She swung open the door of the kitchen, where Margaret was cooking their evening meal. The opening of the door caused a draught. The draught brought disaster. The flames of the candles were blown sideways and contacted the dry, imitation, pine-needles of the tree.

Whoosh! it went. It made a noise like the wind in the chimney on a stormy evening. Just the one - Whoosh! The tree was consumed. Just like the sudden letting off of a huge firework on bonfire night! The flames leaped aloft, ceiling-high, leaving a black patch there. The main trunk and a few blackened branches remained with the glass ornaments on them. It looked really ugly now.

Gwyn stood transfixed, aghast at what had happened. The sudden turn around from delight to disaster was a shock. Michael let out a frightened shout. Margaret leaped into the room, terrified at first, and then with anger blazing in her eyes, when she realised what had happened and who had caused it.

She grabbed Michael by the scruff of his neck and bundled him upstairs, smacking the backs of his legs with the flat of her hand, all the way to his bedroom. "Stay there! I've told you not to play with matches," she shouted then she slammed the door on him.

It wasn't the first time that Michael had played with fire and courted disaster.

Sometimes he and Gwyn had arrived home before Margaret. One afternoon, they'd let themselves in using the key their mother had left hidden. Margaret had dampened the fire down by covering it with ashes before going out to her cleaning job. Michael poked the ashes with the iron poker kept with firetongs at the side of the fireplace. Michael was allowed to put coal on the fire and encourage it to revive and warm the room.

If the fire had gone out, he was permitted to clean out the grate and lay a new fire. He was good at that, using a sheet of newspaper, crossed firewood sticks and making a pyramid of small pieces of coal. The skill was in leaving spaces between the combustibles so that air could flow easily and spread the flames upwards from the easily ignited paper underneath. He had been told to wait for his mother to arrive before he ever lit the newspaper. "I don't want you to set the house on fire!"

He and Gwyn would keep their coats on until the room warmed up. Being cold for much of the year was one of the worst features of the war as far as Michael was concerned. Both children suffered from chilblains. Worst of all, was if you got some snow down the inside of your Wellington boots. The backsof their knees were often chapped.

To make the fire blaze quickly, Michael had seen his mother spread a sheet of newspaper across the open fireplace. Air would be sucked in down below and the strong draught would increase the amount of oxygen and make the flames fare up. To increase the draught, you could open a door or a window for a short while. It could be a dangerous procedure, because the newspaper might catch alight, and sparks fly into the room. Michael felt he was the real thing, when his mother let him follow that slightly dodgy procedure, but only when she was there to watch him.

Only once had he tried it when his mother was not there. It had been a frightening experience. Wind roared down the chimney. The newspaper had flared up suddenly, and bits of charred paper floated around the room with red bits still glowing angrily on them. He and Gwyn tracked them anxiously, watched where they landed and stamped them out before they could set fire to anything in the room. The danger passed. He had not been tempted to do it again!

He still enjoyed being the man with the matches when his mother was there. When the fire was going well, Michael and Gwyn would warm themselves in front of it. "Don't put your feet too near," Margaret would warn them, "or you'll make your chilblains worse!" She should know, Michael thought; his mother always had chilblains and scorched legs every winter.

Michael didn't like going errands much but he enjoyed doing the washing-up after meals. He washed and Gwyn dried. He'd fill the sink up with hot water and stir Oxydol into it. He'd flick soapsuds at Gwyn. Sometimes they played splashing each other. It reminded Michael of when he and his sister had their baths together when they were younger. Margaret was not amused if they spilt water all over her kitchen floor.

Sometimes Margaret would let the children play with containers and floating objects in the bath upstairs. She warned them not to use too much hot water. "We haven't much coal ration left and it takes a lot to heat the water," she'd remind them. It was good, kneeling side-by-side, on a waterproof mat and leaning over the side of the bath, playing naval war games with bits of wood for ships and trying to sink empty matchboxes with water 'bombed' from their cupped hands. When they played there a long time, their hands were all swollen and creased with being in the water so long.

Water play was okay but he still liked playing with fire. There were all sorts of other enjoyable things you could do with matches. Michael liked lighting the gas-stove, but was always a bit apprehensive. The gas coming out of a ring made a plopping noise as it ignited. If Michael left it too long, because a matchstick broke and he had to strike another, the plopping sound was more like a bang. Coal gas smelled horrible. He knew it was dangerous and could cause a minor explosion if you took too long finding the the outlets in the dark oven. "Mind you don't singe your eyebrows!" his mother would warn, if he put his head inside the oven, trying to see where the gas jets were.

Fireworks were unobtainable. For bonfire night, there were ways around the wartime shortages. Mr Martin had 'contacts' who supplied him with indoor fireworks, including sparklers and sulphur matches, which burned in a variety of colours when lit. They were a bit tame but they gave off pungent clouds of intriguing coloured smoke. Mrs Martin asked Michael and Gwyn round to a special tea and afterwards the children took it in turns to hold the sparklers and wave them around, making silvery-golden patterns in the air.

Gwyn was frightened at first, then risked holding hers when she saw that the sparkles of iron-filings did not burn the other children when it was their turn.

The previous autumn, Wilf had been anxious to be mobile on Michael's bicycle after dark. He'd acquired a carbide lamp. Ordinary lights and their batteries were hard to come by. He bought some lumps of carbide from a chemist's shop, poured water over the carbide and lit it. Michael was very impressed by this. Wilf showed him how it worked. He told Rob about it and Rob bought some carbide for the friends to mess about with. Messing about was still a favoured occupation.

They piled it all up one evening when it was almost dusk. They were by the shed at the bottom of Michael's back garden. Michael brought a jar of water from the kitchen and they poured it over the carbide, which started hissing and bubbling and giving off a foul smell. Rob had some matches. He lit one and threw it on the carbide. Flames leaped into the evening sky and their fire burned steadily.

A couple of minutes later, the ever-vigilant Mr. Jackson appeared, striding down the garden path. He was really angry with them. "What do you think you're doing? No lights after dark!"

"It's not dark yet," Rob protested.
"None of your lip, young man!"

He went and knocked on the back door of Michael's house and asked Margaret for a bucket of water. "I thought you'd have known better than to let them have a fire going, this late in the day!" he told her.

Margaret protested, "What an earth are you going on about? I didn't know what they were up to!" She had been busy inside the house and had not noticed what the boys were doing. She said she was sorry and filled a bucket with water. Mr Jackson took it from her, walked down the garden and threw it over the fire. It had the immediate effect of causing the fire to blaze up even more and of sending the  ARP Warden into a rage. He shouted at Michael, "You! Fetch me a spade. Quick!"

Michael went into the garden shed and fetched his dad's spade. Mr Jackson set to work, digging up earth and throwing it over the fire. It took more than a half dozen spadefuls to extinguish the fire. He handed the spade back to Michael and then gave both the boys, a stern lecture. "If it depended on you two, we'd have lost the war ages ago!"

The most dangerous 'good adventure' involved messing about with thunder-flashes. These were explosive devices used by the Home Guard on manouveres. They were meant to go off bang loudly and flash vividly, in an attempt to give Dad's Army some idea of what it might be like to be under real fire in a real battle.

Paul's dad was in the Home Guard and had pilfered a few of these. Paul brought one with him, one Saturday afternoon, when the boys were playing their war games near the hedge at the top of the road. Paul had only 'borrowed' it for his friends to have a look at it. Rob had other ideas! When it exploded, there were singed eyebrows and terror in the ranks before they all had the presence of mind to go and hide behind the hedge.

Margaret, the Martins and three other people from further down the road came out of their houses and looked around, trying to trace the source of the mysterious explosion, which they had heard clearly from indoors.

"Must have been a car back-firing," said Mr Ward from the opposite side of the road.
"What car?" muttered Margaret, staring intently at the field.

The boys kept their heads down and stayed very quiet and still. The grown-ups went back inside. Then the boys chortled with glee.

Authority had been baffled by what they'd done! However, they didn't ask Paul to bring any more thunderflashes. They knew they'd had a lucky escape from being severely burned.

Another thing they'd enjoyed was setting parts of the field on fire. Then they flailed with their coats and stamping-feet to keep the burning grass within bounds and to put it out. They enjoyed playing with fire, liked frightening themselves and loved risking being caught by Authority.

Until the Christmas tree was destroyed because of his disobedience, Michael had gambled dangerously in a variety of ways and won. The destruction of the tree should have been a lesson to him!

When Christmas finally came, it was a happy one. Gordon was home on leave and more relaxed, more like his old self than he had been for years. Soon the war would be over, everybody believed it now, and he would be back for good. He could not wait for that to happen. He'd soon put his neglected house and garden in order and be finishing projects which were only half done in 1939. He was delighted that he and Margaret were happy together again and making plans for the better times just around the corner.

Nan came round for Christmas Day and there were no provocative remarks from her to upset her daughter-in-law. A friend 'in the know' had provided a chicken for the meal and they'd clubbed together to buy it. Margaret made it last for four more meals in various guises.

In addition to the family's Christmas party on Christmas Day, there was one on Boxing Day when the Matthews came to tea and stayed the evening. Jack and Gordon had a long chat about politics.

Jack was jubilant. "You'll see, as soon as it's over the old gang will be out on their ear."
"How can you be so sure?"
"People have learned. The only way to run a country is to pull together. That's what they've been telling us for six years and people have seen it works. They've convinced folk about something which will be their own downfall. Cooperation's going to replace competition. Sharing's going to takeover from grabbing profits!"
"I hope you're right," Gordon responded, not convinced.

Jack kept on at him, "You should know better than I do. From what I've heard, all the Forces are determined to have a better deal after the war." Gordon had to admit that he hadn't talked much about politics recently. All he could think about was surviving his last two missions. After that, it would be easy street for him until the war was over. He'd be given a job as an instructor or, better still, become a member of an Air Force roadshow. He'd love going round the country, with a Lancaster bomber, letting people have a close-up of one of the famous aeroplanes.

Jack was all fired-up, talking about the New Education Act. "Even the Tories are in favour of that. It'll make a big difference to all our kids."

Gordon thought to himself, "Our Michael's doing all right as it is, thank you very much."

Jack went on, "You must have read the Beveridge Report! All the changes for good he wants! And he's only a Liberal. Just imagine what we'll do, when our lot get into power! Real power for the first time! There are good times coming Gordon!"

Gordon felt his batteries recharging. The war had got him down. Now he was revitalising. He was moved by Jack's enthusiasm. He said, "I'm out of touch Jack. All I think about is the war. I'm sure you'll be around to make sure we win the peace."

Before the Matthews went home, Michael and Rob compared notes. Christmas was not over yet. They had invitations to quite a few parties. It was as though people were anticipating victory and in a mood to celebrate at every opportunity. Whatever the reason, all the stops were pulled out to give the children a good time.

There was the Cubs-and-Brownies combined party. The three boys were invited, although they were too old to belong to the Cubs now. Akela asked "three of my best lads" back for the special occasion. The three friends had belonged to the Scouts, only very briefly, after they left the Cubs. Authority was too much in charge there, so they soon relinquished their membership of that organisation. It meant that they were not invited to the Scouts-and-Girl Guides party.

Michael went to the Choir's party and the Sunday School party. It was amazing how the mothers found goodies for the events despite rationing. Everywhere they went the boys had a feast.

Michael went with his sister to Nan's Working Men's Club party, where they had a super tea, played games, had competitions with prizes for the winners, and were given an apple and an orange at home time.

All of the family went to the Church party. Again, the committee had managed to provide a variety of sandwiches, trifles, cakes and mince-pies. Each child was given a Christmas cracker and a balloon. Michael enjoyed watching his Mam and Dad dancing together to gramophone music. They were really good ballroom-dancers.

Michael and Gwyn were in complete agreement. It was the best Christmas ever! Their Mam and Dad enjoyed it too. Gordon would have liked a few drinks in the house. But the money would only go so far. You could not expect to have everything you wanted. He went back off leave, feeling that he was a very fortunate man. Life really was beginning all over again for him at forty!

For Michael, best of all wasYvonne Robson's party. Yvonne had been in the same class as the boys at Ryelands School. It was her birthday, five days after Christmas. There were six boys and six girls at her party. It was held in one of the bigger houses on Cross Hill.

They had a Beetle Drive then a slap-up feed. After tea, they played Spinning The Bottle, Postman's Knock, Truth, Dare Or Promise, Charades and Sardines.

Rob was disdainful, but Paul and Michael made no secret of enjoying kissing girls. Michael managed to do this several times before they played Sardines. He hid in a narrow brush-cupboard and could not believe his luck when pretty Yvonne squeezed in there with him. They were two of the last to be found and Michael felt that it was one of the best adventures that he'd ever had, in the dark, with Yvonne Robson.

When they were walking home, Paul asked Michael, "What did you do? What did she let you do?"

"Nothing!" Michael defended robustly. "It was only a stupid game wasn't it?"
"They were all stupid games!" Rob added, vehemently, still in recovery-mode after his lengthy encounter, entombed, under a single bed during Sardines, with Yvonne's older sister, a big girl for her age and two stones heavier than he.

There was snow and sledging during January. They went as often as possible to the Shell Hole before the snow melted. Yvonne Robinson was always there, with her friend Patsy. Yvonne always managed to be near Michael in the queue waiting to go down the Shell Hole. She had a really good sledge. Michael was sharing a home-made one with Paul. That year, Rob had one of his own. After they'd had three goes, Yvonne said to Michael, "You can come with me if you like."
Rob guffawed!

Michael accepted the offer. All of the kids were wearing several layers of thick clothing. Close bodily contact was impossible. Michael still found it interesting to lie on top of Yvonne when they sped down the slope. She held onto the front of the sledge and steered it. Michael held onto her shoulders as they plunged into the deep crater and took off from the top of the other side. The extra weight made the sledge hurtle down the slope, towards Thompson's gate.

At the last moment, Michael realised that they were heading straight for the stone gatepost. He threw himself, sideways off the sledge. Sir Galahad abandoned his Fair Lady! Every man for himself!. The sledge and Yvonne hit the gatepost a terrific smack, still going at breakneck speed.Yvonne screamed and was thrown off.

All of the other kids were running to see what had happened to her. Yvonne's nose had been flattened and her face was covered in blood. She and her friend ran off down Powder House Lane and up Cross Hill to her home. Michael and Paul followed, pulling her sledge for her. Poor Yvonne's nose was broken and she had two enormous black eyes for ages.

"It's always the same!" Michael thought. "Just when you're really enjoying yourself, something unexpected happens to spoil it." What happened next in his life certainly underlined that thought!