Bia's War (24 page)

“There was silence after
Dennison stopped speaking. I think we were all so taken aback at
the casual way in which he talked of committing multiple murder,
that no-one could think of anything to say in reply. The pig
butcher was the only one who was capable of speaking at that point
in time, although I honestly believe he didn’t know that he had
shocked us all that much. When he’d gathered his thoughts, he took
up the story again.”

“‘So. Davy Wilson was in the Red
Lion the other night and because I’ve known him for years, when I’d
got my pint, I went and sat with the lad and asked him how it was
going, over there at the Front. He was staring across the room at a
man who was standing at the bar and he wouldn’t take his eyes off
him, even when he was answering my questions. It didn’t take me
long to realise that he was staring at our very own William
Drinkwater and, because I have an interest in Drinkwater’s wife, I
asked him why he was staring at the weasel. So he told me why and
that is the reason I want him dead.’”

“‘When groups of men enlisted
for the army when the war first started, those men tended to be
kept together and served alongside men they had known all their
lives.’ Dennison continued. ‘So my son, Albert, my only child, was
in the same group of lads as Davy Wilson and dear old William
Drinkwater. One early morning, before day had dawned, they were
sent out into No Man’s Land to set traps and barbed wire for the
enemy, should they ever take it into their heads to cross over No
Man’s Land and attack the British trenches. It’s dangerous work,
out there in No Man’s Land, because there are shell holes to fall
into in the dark, unexploded ordinance to stumble across and set
off and, worst of all, you’re a sitting duck for enemy
snipers.’”

“ ‘So, there they all were,
digging holes to put wooden stakes into so that they could string
barbed wire across them, when the coming of the dawn caught them a
great distance from the comparative safety of their own trenches
and they had to take shelter in a massive shell hole. It was
possible that they were going to have to stay in it for the rest of
the day and wait for darkness before they could work their way back
to the English line. One of the lads had been wounded in the leg
which Davy Wilson had bandaged up for him and they were all praying
that he would be strong enough to move quickly on it when the time
came. That day, the Hun decided that he was going to enjoy himself
by staging a raid on the English front line, so, not long after
they had reached the comparative safety of the crater, the guns
began firing. Our English guns joined in, adding their noise and
smoke to the general hell and our little band of soldiers hunkered
down in their rat hole, praying that they would all survive the day
and make it back to their own trenches. When it came to the bottom
line, there was as good a chance that they would be killed by one
of their own cannons as by a Hun cannon.’”

“ ‘So, they were trapped in the
shell hole and all around them the war went on, guns firing and
shells landing and never knowing if the next one would have your
number on it. The noise and the dirt and the smells were
overwhelming and there was nothing that they could do about
it.’”

“I could almost hear the
cacophony that Dennison was describing and I could definitely feel
the fear those lads had experienced, or William’s fear of what
Dennison was going to do or say next was so palpable that I was
picking it up from him. Whatever the cause, fear was a tangible
emotion in that warehouse and I could see Peter literally vibrating
with the tension.”

“‘There they were then,’
Dennison continued, unaware of the pressures at work in the room.
‘Davy and his mates, sitting in that shell crater in Flanders,
waiting for the Bosche and the English to stop firing, so that they
could crawl out of it and make their way back to their trenches.
But the guns continued to fire, the big ones and the little ones,
the cannons and the small arms, which meant that our little group
of lads were all pinned down in that crater until the shelling
stopped. Even when that happened, they would have to wait until it
was dark, so that they could escape unseen by any snipers. The only
early release would come if the fighting moved away from that
frontline and, as the line hadn’t moved for months, none of the
lads was counting on it happening that day. My lad, my Albert, was
one of that little band of soldiers and he waited with the rest of
them, flinching every time a shell landed or a bullet whistled past
his ear. They were all nearly deafened by the noise, Davy said, and
all worrying when a shell or a bullet would arrive that had their
number on it.’

“Dennison paused at that moment,
whether because he was taking a breath or because he was living his
son’s fear, I didn’t know. Before anyone else could speak, he began
talking again.”

“‘They didn’t post a look-out,
because if one of them had raised his head above the level of the
top of the crater, it would have been seen and become a target for
a sniper. They were all hunkered down on the bottom of the hole,
trying to keep as flat as possible so that they weren’t used for
target practise and they were all unaware that, for the first time
in months, the situation was changing and the Hun had decided to
mount a raid towards the Allied lines. Under cover of the smoke
coming from both sets of guns, the Hun soldiers were crossing No
Man’s Land and one of them reached the crater where our boys were
sheltering. He managed to shoot two of the lads before the others
realised that he was there, but Davy was quick-witted and managed
to shoot back before the Hun got any more of them. The Hun soldier
keeled over into the pit and one of the lads grabbed his
rifle.’”

“ ‘Two more of the enemy saw
what had happened and they appeared over the lip of the crater,
rifles at the ready, but our lads were now ready for them and Davy
got the first one in the head. He was already shooting at the
second one when he saw something that he would never have believed
was possible. My Albert had his rifle ready and would have killed
the second Hun soldier, but William Drinkwater, who was laid next
to Albert at the bottom of the crater, put both his arms round
Albert and rolled him over on top of himself. Albert had no idea
that William Drinkwater was going to do that and so he rolled,
unresisting, into Drinkwater’s arms. The Hun fired his rifle and
the bullet hit my son in his back and killed him instantly. The
second bullet fired by the Hun went through William Drinkwater’s
arm and into my lad’s back. Davy then managed to pull himself
together and he shot the enemy soldier. Our lads lay breathless at
the bottom of the shell hole and waited to see if any more of the
enemy would discover their hiding place, but they didn’t. The
fighting moved away from the crater and Davy had time to yank
Albert off Drinkwater’s prone figure, to see if he could save him.
But my lad was dead, killed by two bullets in the back, as though
he had been trying to run away, as though he was a coward, but he
wasn’t. The only coward in that group was your beloved husband, who
didn’t care who was killed as long as it wasn’t him.’”

“‘The bullet in Drinkwater’s arm
had shattered the bone, so one of the other lads roughly bandaged
it because they didn’t want him to die before they could get him to
a court martial. But he was lucky, was this lily-livered excuse for
a soldier, and no-one believed Davy when he reported what had
happened. The powers-that-be didn’t want to believe that one of
their soldiers was a coward so they decided that he had suffered
enough when he had to have his arm amputated, so they dismissed him
and he came home a hero and now he lives in luxury, when my lad’s
dead.’”

“Dennison stopped speaking as he
immersed himself in grieving for his lost son and, even though he
had just murdered my son, I could feel for him. I now knew what it
was like to lose your only son, but the last thing I would have
done would have been to murder somebody else’s child, so my empathy
only went so far. Sam, it seemed, was all out of empathy, sympathy
or forgiveness that night, because he turned on William and
demanded answers.”

“‘Is all that true? He asked.
‘Did you use that lad as a shield to save yourself?’ Sammy’s voice
was incredibly high-pitched, as though he couldn’t believe the
depths to which William had sunk and, for the first time that
night, William reacted.”

“‘No I didn’t!’ William cried.
‘He fell on top of me when the Hun soldier shot him and his body
stopped the bullets that were meant for me! I’m not a coward!’”

“Dennison was on his feet
immediately, yanking at the twine fastened round William’s neck so
strongly that the chair legs lifted with the force and William and
the chair fell over sideways onto the floor. His head hit the
ground with a bang that reverberated right through the building and
William’s whining voice stopped instantly.”

“‘Don’t lie now, you
yellow-bellied bastard!’ The pig butcher screamed. ‘You’re going to
meet your Maker in the next few minutes, at least go with a clear
conscience! Davy Wilson told me exactly what you did. My lad didn’t
fall on top of you, you pulled him! Those were Davy’s exact words –
you wrapped your arms round my Albert and pulled him over onto you
to shield you. Davy looked at you as you did it and he saw the
guile and the cunning in your face. You knew exactly what you were
doing. You were quick-thinking enough to use my son to save your
own miserable life and now you think you can lie about it!’”

“By the time he got to the end
of this speech, Dennison was breathless with rage and the rest of
us were stunned by the revelations. William stayed where he was on
the floor, either because the fall had stunned him or because he
was frightened that if he attempted to raise himself up then the
butcher would finish the job he had started. His eyes, however,
were darting this way and that, as though he was looking for a
means of escape. It was the most surreal moment of my life,
standing in that dimly-lit warehouse, with my son dead on the floor
and his murderer ready to wreak his vengeance on my husband for
what my husband had done to his son. I felt as though I was in the
middle of a nightmare, a nightmare that was so unreal it wasn’t
possible and yet I was living through it.”

Nana Lymer paused in her tale
and glanced across at Victoria to see how she was coping with
learning these terrible things about her grandmother’s earlier
life. But Victoria was drinking it all in. There was no trace of
revulsion or disgust on her face at what had happened. Her whole
face was suffused with pity for her grandmother and, as Nana Lymer
paused for breath, Victoria reached out and took hold of the tiny
hand which was clenched on the counterpane.

“What a dreadful time you had,
Nana.” Victoria whispered. “Having your baby killed by that butcher
and then learning what a miserable coward your husband was. I don’t
know how you could recover from that. And being threatened by him
as well. He obviously didn’t murder anyone else because you and
Granddad Sam both lived long after that night, so how did you
overpower him? Did you get to your knife and stab him? But, if you
did, you would have been arrested for murder yourself. What
happened?”

“I think we’ll have to go into
that after Mr Vine’s been this afternoon. It must be nearly
lunchtime by now and we need you on duty at the side door to let Mr
Vine in after lunch.” Nana smiled.

“Goodness! Is it that time?”
Victoria screeched. “I’m supposed to be starting lunch for Mam!
I’ll never hear the end of it if I haven’t got it done when she
comes through into the kitchen from the shop. I’ll be back when I
bring your lunch and then I’ll listen out for Mr Vine this
afternoon.”

“You are a good girl, Victoria.”
Nana Lymer said, cupping her palm round the side of Victoria’s
face. “Don’t let your mother get you down. You are going to have a
wonderful life, just you wait and see. Now, off you go because this
afternoon is going to be very important.”

Victoria managed to get
downstairs into the kitchen and get the lunch made before her
parents came through into the kitchen when they had closed the
shop. Everything was going to plan so far. Her mother made no demur
when Victoria said she was going back to ‘revise’ in Nana’s bedroom
straight after lunch, which meant that they would have time for
some more of the story before Victoria took up her position on the
first landing, ready to nip down the last few stairs and open the
side door for Mr Vine when he knocked. The only problem was that
Victoria now felt guilty that she was keeping a secret from her
parents, although she didn’t understand why Mr Vine’s visit had to
be so secretive. She just hoped that she wasn’t going to get into
trouble with her mother for not telling her what she had done when
she had made the appointment for that afternoon. Each time she got
to this point in her musings, her analytical brain asked why her
grandmother shouldn’t see her solicitor and she couldn’t provide a
logical answer. She was fully aware, however, that if her mother
ever found out, there was going to be one hell of a row about it
and she wasn’t looking forward to that possible outcome.

After a quick lunch and as soon
as her parents were back in the shop, Victoria shot back up the
stairs to Nana’s bedroom.

“It’s just before 1 o’clock,
Nana.” She gasped out as she collapsed into her chair. “Mr Vine
isn’t coming until 2pm, so we’ve got time for some more of the
story before I have to go and wait on the landing for him to come.
Do you think you’re up to telling me some more?”

“Of course I’m ‘up to it’,
Victoria” Nana answered. “You don’t realise how much good this is
doing me. I feel as though I am getting things into perspective for
the first time in years, because I’ve never had the opportunity to
mull it over before. Granddad didn’t want to discuss it after it
happened and it became a subject that we all avoided, I think to my
cost. It’s been getting me down for the last few years and I feel
so much relief now it’s coming out into the open. It’s been like a
canker in my heart since it happened and I now feel that I am
cutting it all away. Let’s get on with it!”