The Pull of the Stars(70)

Oh, janey mac, poor lad. Poor lads.

It struck me now that war might just have heated and forged that friendship into something harder to name, impossible to describe. Was I a fool not to have thought of that before? It wasn’t something I could imagine ever asking Tim, any more than I’d know how to tell him about this night on the rooftop with Bridie.

No matter how cold we got, she and I didn’t stir from that spot. Every so often our mouths were speaking so close, they stopped for a while and kissed. I was so happy I thought I’d burst, and in the moments between the kissing I was almost more so.

When had that spark between us first caught, glowed, begun to singe? I hadn’t noticed; I’d been too busy. With births coming pell-mell after deaths, when would I have had time to wonder at something as unimportant as my own new feelings, much less worry about them?

We were both yawning. I said, This was mad, coming up here. You need your sleep.

And you don’t?

I’ve been trained to stay up, hardened—

I’m harder, Bridie said with a grin, and younger and tougher.

Point taken.

Sure we can sleep when we’re dead, she told me.

I was groggy but exalted, felt as if I’d never sleep again.

But we must have lapsed into silence and dropped off without realising it, because I woke when Bridie moved beside me against the pitched roof. I straightened my stiff neck. The Great Bear had crawled across the sky; hours must have passed.

Cramp in my leg! Bridie gasped as she straightened it.

I admitted with a shiver, I can’t feel either of mine. I thumped one foot on the slates; it felt as if it were someone else’s.

I’m awful thirsty, said Bridie.

I wished I had another orange for her. Do you want to go down to the canteen for a cup of tea?

I don’t want to go anywhere.

Her eyes were so fond, they made me dizzy. It was as if this rooftop were an airship floating above the soiled world, and nothing could happen as long as we stayed up here gripping each other’s icy fingers so hard we didn’t know whose were whose.

After a bit, I insisted we stand up for a minute to get the blood flowing. We levered each other to our feet, shook ourselves doggishly. Even danced a little, stiffly, laughing, our breath making puffs of white on the dark air.

I’d like to go to that place where you lived, Bridie, and knock it down. Tear it apart, brick from brick.

It was stone, actually.

Stone from stone, then.

She said, What bothers me most to remember is the little ones wailing.

I waited.

Your charge would cry and cry, see, and there was nothing you could do.

Your charge?

Whatever toddler they put in a crib beside your bed to look after once you got big.

What do you mean by big—fourteen, fifteen?

Bridie’s lip pulled up on one side, almost a smile. More like eight or nine. And here’s the thing—if your charge got into mischief, you’d both be punished. And if she took sick, that was on you too.

I struggled to take this in. You’re saying you’d be blamed for her illness?

Bridie nodded. And the little ones were sick all the time. Loads of them went in the hole at the back of the buildings.

I’d lost the thread. You’re saying they caught something from playing underground?

No, Julia! That’s where they got put…after.

Oh. A grave.

Bridie said, Just one big hole, with nothing written.

I thought of the Angels’ Plot in the cemetery where Delia Garrett’s unwoken girl would be buried. Small children did die, poor ones more often than others, and unwanted ones even more often than that. But…

The injustice of that, I said, to hold an eight-year-old child accountable for a toddler’s death!

Well, said Bridie flatly. I have to tell you, the odd time I was so hungry, I couldn’t help robbing my charge.

Robbing her of what?

She hesitated, then said, I’d eat her bread. Drink half the milk from her bottle and fill it up at the tap.

Oh, Bridie.

We all did it. But that’s no comfort.

My eyes were prickling. This young woman had survived by whatever means necessary, and I found I couldn’t wish that it had been otherwise.

I’ve never told anyone these old stories, said Bridie.

(Old stories, she called them, as if they were legends of the Trojan War.)

She added, I probably shouldn’t be telling you either.

Why not?

Well, you know what I’m like now, Julia.

What you’re like?

Bridie said it very softly: Dirty.

You are not!

Eyes shut, she whispered: Things happened.

To you?

Things were done to lots of us. Most of us, I bet.

My pulse was thumping. Done by whom?

She shook her head as if that wasn’t the point. A workman, a priest maybe. A minder or teacher, she’d pick one girl to warm her bed and give her a second blanket after.

I was sick to my stomach.

She added, Or a holiday father.

What on earth’s a holiday father?

A local family would request a child for the weekend, to give her a little holiday, like. You might get sweets or pennies.

I wanted to block my ears.

She went on, One of the fathers gave me a whole shilling. But I couldn’t think what to do with that much money or where to hide it, so I ended up burying it in the ashpit.